LAVISH PALACES WHERE AUTHORITARIAN RULERS LIVE

What do Ukraine’s Mezhyhirya Residence, Turkmenistan’s Oguzhan Palace, and Turkey’s Presidential Complex have in common? All were built at enormous expense, flaunting lavish amenities and sprawling grounds — monuments to the wealth and power of authoritarian rule.

Here’s a look at some of the world’s grandest presidential residences, where opulence meets political might.

UKRAINE, Novi Petrivtsi: Mezhyhirya Residence

Mezhyhirya was Viktor Yanukovych’s residence during his time as Ukraine’s prime minister and president until he fled amid the 2014 Maidan Revolution. Now a “museum of corruption,” it boasts a car museum, golf course, zoo, fountains, helicopter pad, and even a church — showcasing the former leader’s lavish lifestyle.

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES, Abu Dhabi: Qasr Al-Watan

Qasr Al-Watan, the presidential palace of the United Arab Emirates, was completed in 2017 and opened to the public in 2019. Built at a cost of $490 million, this predominantly white palace houses historical artifacts and manuscripts while also displaying diplomatic gifts received by the U.A.E.

TURKEY, Ankara: Presidential Complex

The Presidential Palace in Ankara, also known as Ak Saray (White Palace), was completed in 2014 for Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Built on former forest land, it boasts over 1,100 rooms and officially cost around $615 million, though critics say the true price was much higher. The complex includes a mosque with a capacity of around 3,000 and Turkey’s largest library, with a collection of more than 4 million books.

RUSSIA, Gelendzhik: ‘Putin’s Palace’

This palace complex on the Black Sea coast near Gelendzhik is rumored to be Vladimir Putin’s residence, with speculation about its existence dating back to 2010. In 2021, the late Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny released an investigative documentary claiming the palace was built for the Russian president at a cost of around $1.4 billion. According to the investigation, the complex features an underground hockey stadium, a theater, a vineyard, and a church. It also has a no-fly zone, and boats passing must give it a wide berth. Putin has denied ownership, while Russian oligarch Arkady Rotenberg claims the palace is his.

RUSSIA, Moscow Region: Novo-Ogaryovo

Novo-Ogaryovo is Vladimir Putin’s state residence located outside Moscow. Originally constructed in the 1950s, the estate underwent extensive renovations under Putin’s direction after 2000. According to some reports, areas have been added to the compound recently, including a recreational facility belonging to Russia’s Federal Protection Service (FSO), heliports, and even air-defense systems. There might also be a tunnel leading from the FSO facility to Putin’s residence.

TAJIKISTAN, Dushanbe: Palace Of The Nation

The Palace of the Nation, completed in 2008, is the official residence of Tajik President Emomali Rahmon. To make space for the palace, a 100-year-old synagogue and other buildings in the neighborhood were controversially demolished. Built for $300 million, the palace is surrounded by parks, fountains, and other notable landmarks, including the Independence Monument and the Dushanbe Flagpole, which rises to a height of 165 meters and was once the tallest in the world.

TURKMENISTAN, Ashgabat: Oguzhan Presidential Palace

The Oguzhan complex is the official residence and workplace of Turkmen President Serdar Berdymukhammedov. Named after an ancient Turkmen tribal leader, it has been home to the country’s presidents since the 1990s. In 2011, a new palace and additional facilities were added at a cost of approximately $350 million. A state reception house and a square for parades and other state events are currently under construction in front of the palace.

FREDDY THE CUSTOM INSPECTION K-9 WAS DOING HIS JOB WHEN A MEAN EGYPTIAN KICKED HIM!

Man who kicked customs dog at Dulles ordered to leave U.S.

A 70-year-old man pleaded guilty to attacking Freddie the Beagle and was ordered to pay $840 in vet fees.

Freddie, a K-9 with the CBP’s Beagle Brigade with his handler CBP Agriculture Specialist Mellisa Snyder at Dulles International Airport in October. (Craig Hudson/For the Washington Post)

Freddie the Customs and Border Protection beagle spent Tuesday morning doing his typical work: patrolling the international baggage claim area at Washington Dulles International Airport for undeclared agricultural products. Then the morning took an unusual turn.

After the dog alerted his handler that a piece of luggage from Cairo was suspicious, the duo approached the suitcase’s owner, a 70-year-old man from Egypt.

“He violently kicked Freddie with sufficient force to lift the 25-pound beagle off the ground,” a CBP news release says. A veterinarian said the dog suffered contusions to his right rib area and ordered “rest and a mild dose of pain meds,” agency spokesman Stephen Sapp said in an email.

Customs officers arrested Hamed Ramadan Bayoumy Aly Marie and took him to a local jail. He was charged with willfully and maliciously harming a police animal.

Further investigation revealed what Freddie had detected: 55 pounds of beef, 44 pounds of rice, 15 pounds of vegetables, corn seeds and herbs — items that were not allowed into the country and seized, according to the news release.

“Being caught deliberately smuggling well over one hundred pounds of undeclared and prohibited agriculture products does not give one permission to violently assault a defenseless Customs and Border Protection beagle,” Christine Waugh, CBP’s Area Port Director for D.C., said in a statement. “We rely heavily on our K9 partners and Freddie was just doing his job. Any malicious attack on one of us is an attack on all of us.”

In a quick resolution, Marie pleaded guilty in federal court during his initial appearance Wednesday. He was ordered to pay restitution for Freddie’s vet fee — $840 — and had to report to CPB to be removed from the U.S. He flew to Egypt on Thursday.

Freddie the beagle suffered bruised ribs. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection)

It was just the latest chapter in an eventful life for the 5-year-old beagle, who was found on a median in Georgia before going to work for the U.S. government. The Washington Post wrote about Freddie and fellow Dulles sniffers in November.

His handler said at the time that he has learned to sniff out meat like cane rat, pigeon, snake and camel in addition to beef and pork. He is part of a “Beagle Brigade” used around the country to keep out diseases, invasive pests and plants.

According to CBP, the agency’s agriculture specialists and canines seized nearly 3,600 prohibited items including plants, meat, animal by-products or soil at U.S. entry points in a standard day last year.

Freddie’s plight drew attention on social media; well-wishers asked for updates in the comments on videos posted earlier this year on an official Facebook page.

In an Instagram post Friday, the agency said the pup would make a full recovery and shared a photo of him sampling a Starbucks “Pup Cup.”

“Freddie should be back in a week,” Sapp said in an email.

WHAT DOES JEFF BEZOS SPEND MONEY ON AND WHAT DOES HE OWN???

From Amazon Stock to Property To Jets, a Look at Mogul’s Wealth

Jeff Bezos used to drive a 1997 Honda Accord and repurposed surplus wooden doors as desks. Now he is one of the wealthiest people in the world.

His vast sums have allowed Bezos to spend on passion projects such as Blue Origin rockets, and a Venice wedding to fiancée Lauren Sanchez that some estimate could cost $15 million to $20 million.

Total wealth

Bezos is among the richest billionaires, according to The Wall Street Journal, which in February estimated his net worth at $263.8 billion.

Bezos owns about 8.6% of Amazon, a percentage valued at roughly $190.56 billion as of early June, per FactSet.

In 2024, Bezos sold about $13.5 billion of Amazon shares.

The billionaire’s private investment firm, called Bezos Expeditions, manages his personal wealth and investments. It has around $107.8 billion of assets, the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute estimated. The firm’s website said it has invested in companies such as Airbnb, Uber Technologies, Perplexity and the Washington Post, as well as spacetransportation company Blue Origin.

Real estate

Bezos is the country’s 23rd-largest landowner, with 420,000 acres across the U.S., according to the Land Report, a trade publication. He has also spent hundreds of millions of dollars on homes, including:

The Warner Estate in Beverly Hills, Calif., at left, which he paid $165 million to buy in 2020.

A 14-acre compound in Maui that cost Bezos $78 million in 2021.

Three properties in Indian Creek—an exclusive island near Miami— that Bezos bought for a total of $234 million in 2023 and 2024

Three apartments at 212 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, costing a collective $80 million in 2019.

Jets and a superyacht

Bezos has become a collector of fancy planes. He also owns a huge yacht that he primarily parks in Port Everglades, Fla.

The 417-foot-long superyacht, named Koru, cost at least $500 million, according to luxury lifestyle publication Robb Report.

Its support vessel, the Abeona, cost an additional $75 million and features a helipad, the publication said.

Bezos owns two jets and two helicopters, according to Jack Sweeney, who tracks celebrity jets. Bezos’ Gulfstream G650ER jet costs more than $50 million, while his G700 ,above, sells for around $75 million.

PRIVATE JETS OF CLIMATE FIGHTERS SUCH AS JOHN KERRY AND BERNIE SANDERS CAUSE MORE CLIMATE DAMAGE THAN AIRLINES!

Study Exposes the Hypocrisy of Climate Cultist Elites and Their Fossil Fuel-Guzzling Private Jets

Private jets produced more emissions than all flights at a major international airport in 2023, according to a new report from the International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT).

The ICCT found that that the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of private jets outweighed the emissions of all flights, including commercial ones, departing London’s Heathrow airport in 2023. Just one private jet produces as much GHG emissions as 177 cars or nine heavy-duty trucks, and there has been an increasing trend in private jet emissions over the past decade, the report states.

“Private jets are a surprisingly large source of air and climate pollution,” ICCT aviation fellow Daniel Sitompul said.

“It’s pretty well known that in a typical year, private jets are responsible for about 2 percent of aviation emissions,” ICCT research director and co-author of the new report Dan Rutherford told The Washington Post. “What we’ve done for the first time is, we’ve basically used flight trajectory data to break that out into the individual contributions of airports and countries.”

The report measures and maps the GHG emissions produced globally by private jets throughout 2023 through a combination of data sources including worldwide flight paths, engine emission databases and airport coordinates, according to the report. ICCT then used the data to “spatially allocate fuel use and emissions to airports and countries for about 94% of private jet activity globally,” according to the report.

Data also indicated that GHG emissions from private jets have increased globally from 2013 to 2023, according to the report.

ICCT compared these data with Heathrow airport’s 2023 sustainability report that notes the emissions of its departures that year, the report indicates. Heathrow is Europe’s busiest airport and is now the fourth busiest in the world, though it was the seventh busiest in 2023, according to Time Out.

Though several environmentalists, celebrities and Democrats shun GHG emissions and support policies that seek to limit them, many of them have been caught using private jets to fly to and from occasions like sporting events and climate change policy summits. For example, the 2024 United Nations Climate Change Conference ushered in guests who arrived on private jets and proceeded to exchange ideas about cutting GHG emissions.

Prominent celebrities that preach about climate change initiatives while still regularly using private jets include Leonardo DiCaprio, Taylor Swift, Oprah and Steven Spielberg among several others. Notably, Independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders also recently defended his private jet usage while on his “fighting oligarchy” tour.

TEXAS SUPREME COURT MAKES COMMON SENSE DECISION REVERSING CRAZY APPELLATE COURT AWARDING $100 MILLION JUDGMENT IN CRASH CASE

Werner Wins $100M Nuclear Verdict Reversal by Texas Court

Ruling Ends Yearslong Battle Stemming From 2014 Fatal Wreck

The case stretches back to a 2018 trial in which a Houston jury returned what stands as one of the highest monetary judgments against a motor carrier. (Werner Enterprises)

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The Texas Supreme Court has ruled in favor of Werner Enterprises, reversing a $100 million jury verdict against the motor carrier upheld by an appellate court in a 2014 fatal crash in which a pickup truck lost control on a slick interstate, traveled across the highway median and collided with a Werner tractor traveling on the opposite stretch of road.

“The foregoing holdings dispose of all claims and require rendition of judgment for the defendants,” the Texas high court wrote in a June 27 ruling. “The court of appeals’ judgment is reversed, and judgment is rendered for the defendants.”

The case stretches back to a 2018 trial in which a Houston jury returned what stands as one of the highest monetary judgments against a motor carrier. Werner first appealed the jury verdict in October 2018 to the Texas Fourteenth Court of Appeals in Houston. That appeal ultimately was denied in a 5-4 decision after languishing in the legal system for several years.

In its case before the state appeals court, Werner objected to the jury’s finding that the driver and company were negligent and also to the judge’s decision to allow certain evidence in the case. Werner also objected to the jury’s award of future medical care expenses for the plaintiffs.

But the Texas high court rejected the notion that the Werner driver shared in the fault for the accident.

“This awful accident happened because an out-of-control vehicle suddenly skidded across a wide median and struck the defendant’s truck, before he had time to react, as he drove below the speed limit in his proper lane of traffic,” the court wrote. “That singular and robustly explanatory fact fully explains why the accident happened and who is responsible for the resulting injuries. Because no further explanation is reasonably necessary to substantially explain the origins of this accident or to assign responsibility for the plaintiffs’ injuries, the rule of ‘proximate causation’ does not permit a fact finder to search for other, subordinate actors in the causal chain and assign liability to them.”

(Supreme Court of Texas via YouTube)

The high court said that nothing the Werner driver, Shiraz Ali, did or didn’t do contributed to the pickup truck hitting ice, losing control, veering into the median and entering oncoming traffic on an interstate highway.

However Ali was driving, the presence of his 18-wheeler in its proper lane of traffic on the other side of Interstate 20 at the precise moment the pickup truck lost control is just the kind of “happenstance of place and time” that cannot reasonably be considered a substantial factor in causing injuries to the plaintiffs.

“Instead [the pickup driver] losing control and hurtling across the median was the substantial factor in bringing about the injuries,” the court wrote. “The presence of Ali’s truck on the other side of the median at that precise moment was merely ‘the condition that made the harm possible.’ ”

“This appeal presents several distinct questions of law of manifest importance to the jurisprudence of the state, at least some of which require the reversal and rendition of the judgment below,” Werner argued in its brief filed with the high court in August 2023. Werner said the state court of appeals’ denial imposes a legal duty on Texas motorists in the state’s largest appellate district to anticipate that vehicles on the other side of a divided highway “will lose control and cross directly into their path.”

It argued further that “a failure to foresee this remote possibility and do everything possible to avoid it, including getting off the road entirely, can make a driver 100% responsible for almost any accident.”

Werner said the relevant facts of the accident are undisputed: Ali was proceeding in his lane, operating and in control of a Werner tractor-trailer, when the plaintiff’s vehicle suddenly careened into his path, leaving him no time to avoid a fatal collision.

Werner ranks No. 18 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of the largest for-hire carriers in North America and No. 32 on the TT Top 100 list of the largest logistics companies in North America.

RADICAL MUSLIM WINS NEW YORK CITY DEMOCRAT (OF COURSE!) MAYORAL PRIMARY-ONLY A FRACTION OF ELIGIBLE VOTERS VOTED IN A “RANKED CHOICE” VOTING METHOD

14 Things everyone needs to Know About the Radical Muslim Socialist That Just Pulled off a Shocking Election Victory in New York City

by: Michael Snyder

By the way, the Muslim takeover of Great Britain has already happened. London and all major British cities have MUSLIM mayors! There are now 3,000 mosques in Britain!

(End of the American Dream)—A far left Muslim socialist that has only been a citizen of the United States for seven years is the Democratic nominee to be the mayor of the biggest city in the United States. Let that sink in for a moment. Zohran Mamdani is a smooth talker, and he ran an excellent campaign. But if this is what the future of America looks like, we are in enormous trouble. He dreams of creating “a socialist New York”, and many analysts are suggesting that if he wins the general election in November it will open the door for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to run for president in 2028.

Can you imagine that?

At one time it was unimaginable that someone like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez could be a legitimate contender for the presidency.

Of course at one time it was unimaginable that someone like Zohran Mamdani could run for mayor of New York City and defeat a big name like Andrew Cuomo, but that just happened…

As elections go, Tuesday’s party primary for mayor was a thunderbolt: New York voters turned away from a well-funded familiar face and famous name, former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, and in doing so made a generational and ideological break with the party’s mainstream. They turned to a 33-year-old, three-term state assemblyman, Zohran Mamdani, who ran on an optimistic message that has eluded many national Democrats about affordability and the rising cost of living.

We live at a time when the Democratic Party has drifted very far to the left, and working class people came out to vote for Mamdani in droves…

Mamdani exceeded more than 60% of the vote in vast swathes of the city, building a multi-ethnic coalition across brownstone Brooklyn, working-class Queens and upper Manhattan.

“The surge by Mamdani is something I’ve never seen before in New York City politics,” J.C. Polanco, a political analyst at the University of Mount Saint Vincent, said before the results were known. “It’s been an incredible campaign that understood social media and marketing like no other.”

But do those voters really understand who this guy is?

I was stunned when I found out what he actually believes.

The following are 14 things that everyone needs to know about Zohran Mamdani…

#1 He was born in Uganda and has only been a U.S. citizen since 2018…

Zohran Kwame Mamdani was born and raised in Kampala, Uganda, moving to New York City with his family at the age of 7. A graduate of the NYC Public School System, he attended the Bronx High School of Science and received a Bachelor’s Degree in Africana Studies from Bowdoin College. A few years later in 2018, he became naturalized as an American citizen.

#2 Mamdani was endorsed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and she campaigned for him vigorously. Once it was clear that he had won, AOC was absolutely thrilled…

“Your dedication to an affordable, welcoming, and safe New York City where king families can have a shot has inspired people across the city,” Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., who endorsed Mamdani, said in a post on X. “Billionaires and lobbyists poured millions against you and our public finance system. And you won.”

#3 He has publicly stated that he dreams of creating “a socialist New York”…

#4 President Trump is calling him a “100% communist lunatic”…

The president piled on a series of insults toward the Democratic nominee for the nation’s largest city, calling him a “100% communist lunatic” who is backed by congressional Democrats. “We’ve had Radical Lefties before, but this is getting a little ridiculous,” Trump said.

#5 He wants to dramatically raise taxes in order to pay for his progressive agenda…

During the 11-candidate campaign for mayor, Mamdani pushed for raising $10 billion in revenue by raising taxes on individuals and businesses to help pay for his ambitious goals, such as eliminating fares on city buses, freezing costs at all rent-stabilized apartments, and establishing city-owned grocery stores.

#6 Billionaire John Catsimatidis is warning that he will have to close or sell all of his grocery stories in New York City if Mamdani’s plan to create government-owned grocery stores comes to fruition…

New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani’s plan to create a network of city-owned grocery stores to drive down food costs is facing pushback from the industry, with the head of a Manhattan-based grocery chain threatening to sell or close the business if Mamdani is elected.

John Catsimatidis, the CEO of grocery chain Gristedes, found fault with Mamdani’s plan, saying the business couldn’t compete in the market if there are city-run supermarkets.

“If the city of New York is going socialist, I will definitely close, or sell, or move or franchise the Gristedes locations,” Catsimatidis told FOX Business. He will also contemplate moving his corporate offices to New Jersey.

#7 He has publicly called for the police to be defunded…

#8 Before he became a U.S. citizen and entered the world of politics, he was a rapper…

In 2016, Mamdani’s song, #1 Spice, produced under the name Young Cardamom with Mamdani’s childhood friend Abdul Car Hussein, who performed as HAB, was featured in Disney’s “Queen of Katwe,” directed by Mamdani’s mother, Mira Nair.

#9 As a student, he co-founded the very first Students for Justice in Palestine chapter at his college…

Taking that lesson with him, he went on to co-found his college’s first Students for Justice in Palestine chapter and later organize across the country with different progressive organizations seeking to win national elections as well as expand healthcare coverage.

#10 His wife is also a pro-Palestinian activist, and she is originally from Syria…

Rama Duwaji stood beside her husband as the 33-year-old Muslim socialist led with 43 percent of the vote and ‘made history’, in his own words.

It was only a few weeks ago that Mamdani hard-launched his wife, who he met on Hinge, sharing a carousel of their wedding pictures on Instagram.

Until recently, the glamorous Syrian illustrator – who uses her art to support America’s growing pro-Palestine movement – was largely absent from her husband’s online mayoral campaign.

#11 Mamdani has been criticized for his defense of the phrase “globalize the intifada”…

An activist for Palestinian causes, Mamdani faced questions over his ability to lead the largest population of Jews outside of Israel. He has refused to say that he supports Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum issued a statement condemning Mamdani’s defense of the use of the phrase “globalize the intifada,” a reference to the armed Palestinian uprisings against Israel.

#12 During an interview, Mamdani admitted that he would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he visited New York City.

#13 He is already being compared to Barack Obama…

“It really represents the excitement that I saw on the streets all throughout the City of New York,” said Letitia James, the New York attorney general. “I haven’t seen this since Barack Obama ran for president of these United States.”

#14 If Mamdani wins the general election in November, he will be the first Muslim mayor in the entire history of the Big Apple…

If elected this November, Mamdani, who was born in Uganda and is of Indian ancestry, would be the city’s first Muslim and first Asian American mayor.

Okay, so let’s assume for a moment that Mamdani actually wins the general election in November.

If that happens, it will be a major milestone for the progressive movement in this country.

Could it also make Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination for president in 2028?

There has already been a lot of talk that she might run…

Speculation is swirling about Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s plans for 2028 after she successfully endorsed dark-horse socialist Zohran Mamdani in the heated New York City Democratic mayoral primary.

Many observers believe the lefty “Squad” member will try to move up from her House seat — whether to the Senate or even the White House — in the aftermath of Mamdani’s stunning upset over ex-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo Tuesday night.

“It just continues to open more doors,” Corbin Trent, Ocasio-Cortez’s former spokesperson and author of America’s Undoing Substack, told The Post. “It just broadens her horizons.”

Even though the U.S. has been moving to the left for decades, I still don’t think that this country is ready for a socialist in the White House.

But I could be wrong.

Very few of the experts thought that Mamdani had a chance to win.

Now it is likely that he will be the next mayor of New York City.

We have allowed socialist ideology to be preached in our high schools, colleges and universities for a long time, and so we shouldn’t be surprised that large numbers of our young people are now socialists.

We are reaping what we have sown, and this is just the beginning.

CHINA DELIVERED FAKE DRIVER LICENSES TO ALLOW MASS ILLEGAL VOTING FOR BIDEN IN 2020 ELECTION, FBI HID THIS INFORMATION, TIK TOK USER DATA USED TO CREATE FALSE ID’S

Patel, Bongino say prior FBI leaders hid evidence of Chinese interference in 2020 election

“Previous FBI leadership chose to play politics and withhold key information from the American people,” the bureau’s new top two leaders say.

FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino alleged Tuesday that the bureau’s prior leadership “chose to play politics” and hide evidence from the American people of a Chinese plot to hijack the 2020 U.S. election with fake mail-in ballots for Joe Biden.

The two FBI leaders’ statement came a week after Just the News reported Patel turned over to Congress earlier this month a long-hidden intelligence report raising concerns that China had mass-produced fake U.S. driver’s licenses to carry out a scheme to swing the 2020 election to Biden with fake mail-in ballots.

Patel located the evidence based on information that Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, got from whistleblowers and forwarded to the FBI, officials said.

Patel and Bongino said Tuesday they are committed to getting Grassley and the American public more evidence about the plot and the failure to fully investigate it.

“Based on our continued review and production of FBI documents related to the CCP’s plot to interfere in the 2020 U.S. Presidential election, previous FBI leadership chose to play politics and withhold key information from the American people – exposing the weaponization of law enforcement for political purposes during the height of the 2020 election season,” Patel and Bongino said in statement given to Just the News.

“Thanks to the great Oversight work of Chairman Grassley, the information the old FBI regime covered up will now be released to the public,” they added. “This FBI leadership team will continue keeping our promise of aggressive transparency and working around the clock to fix the underlying problems to restore the FBI to the trusted institution the American people deserve.”

The newly declassified intelligence reports from August 2020 weren’t corroborated or fully investigated and instead were recalled from intelligence agencies at about the time that then-FBI Director Chris Wray testified there were no known plots of foreign interference ahead of the 2020 election in which Biden defeated Donald Trump, officials told Just the News.

When they were recalled, FBI officials asked fellow spy agencies to destroy their copies of the intelligence report, which included detailed information from a cooperating confidential human source.

“This report was recalled in order to re-interview the source. Recipients should destroy all copies of the original report and remove the original report from all computer holdings,” the recall notice obtained by Just the News stated.

The subject line of the FBI intelligence bulletin succinctly stated the potential nature of the alleged plot: “Chinese Government Production and Export of Fraudulent US Driver’s Licenses to Chinese Sympathizers in the United States, in Order to Create Tens of Thousands of Fraudulent Mail-in Votes for US Presidential Candidate Joe Biden, in late August 2020

That said, the FBI bulletin provided significantly detailed information for agencies to investigate as leads to make sure the U.S. election wasn’t being hijacked by a foreign power seeking to exploit a sudden explosion in mail-in voting during the COVID-19 pandemic that struck earlier in 2020.

“In late August 2020, the Chinese government had produced a large amount of fraudulent United States driver’s licenses that were secretly exported to the United States,” the report reads “The fraudulent driver’s licenses would allow tens of thousands of Chinese students and immigrants sympathetic to the Chinese Communist Party to vote for U.S. presidential candidate Joe Biden despite not being eligible to vote in the United States.”

“China had collected private US user data from millions of TikTok accounts, to include name, ID and address, which would allow the Chinese government to use real US persons’ information to create the fraudulent driver’s license,” the report continues. “The fraudulent driver’s licenses were to include true ID number and true address of US citizens, making them difficult to detect. China planned to use the fraudulent driver’s licenses to account for tens of thousands of mail-in votes.”

GET USA RESIDENCY WITH $5 MILLION COST GOLDEN VISA, ALMOST 70,000 HAVE APPLIED!

Lutnick hails Trump’s $5mn investor visa as almost 70,000 apply

Programme to grant foreigners legal residency in US in exchange registers 68,703 people on waiting list

a person looking at the new website on a phone and laptop for the planned $5 million US residency permit — Commerce secretary Howard Lutnick said the Trump card will be made of gold. ‘It will be beautiful’ © Etienne Laurent/AFP/Getty Images

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Alex Rogers in Washington

Published13 hours ago

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Nearly 70,000 people have signed up for the new golden Trump Card, a visa scheme led by commerce secretary Howard Lutnick that will grant foreigners legal residency in the US at a cost of $5mn.

Last week, Lutnick’s department launched a website — trumpcard.gov — for would-be applicants to register their interest in the visa and to provide basic contact information, including their name, email address and region of the world. The card shown on the website features President Donald Trump’s face and signature, as well as an eagle, the Statue of Liberty and the American flag.

On Monday morning, Lutnick said his department’s internal online dashboard showed 67,697 people on the waiting list. Within an hour, the number had jumped to 68,703.

“The card will be made of gold,” the US commerce secretary told the Financial Times. “It will be beautiful.”

“Donald Trump appreciates these kinds of things. He cares about how it looks. He cares about how it feels. I mean, he deeply cares about that, and thinks if you’re going to buy and make this investment in America, we should give you something that is beautiful.”

Commerce secretary Howard Lutnick — US commerce secretary Howard Lutnick has said issuing 200,000 visas would reap $1tn for the Treasury © Eric Lee/Bloomberg

Lutnick has said the initial idea for the visa came from billionaire Trump donor John Paulson as a way to raise revenue for the US and help it pay down its $36tn debt.

The commerce secretary said the Trump Card will appeal to business leaders and companies seeking legal residency in the US for themselves or their employees.

The chief executive of a global technology company who asked not to be named said through a spokesperson that his group would seek to buy more than 100 Trump cards if the scheme comes to “fruition”, adding he viewed the initiative as a way “to welcome the world’s best and brightest to the United States — particularly entrepreneurs, engineers, and scientists”.

In 1990, Congress created a route to permanent residency for foreign investors through the EB-5 visa programme, which has a minimum investment of up to $1.8mn. About 14,000 such visas were granted last year, according to Invest In the USA, an EB-5 trade association.

Commerce Secretary Lutnick is pressing for the new scheme to replace the EB-5 visa, and is planning to expedite the creation of a much larger programme within months.

The commerce department plans to issue tens of thousands of Trump cards over the summer, said people familiar with the matter. Lutnick has said issuing 200,000 visas would reap $1tn for the Treasury.

Lutnick in May travelled with the president to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates and concluded his conversations with foreign dignitaries with a pitch for the Trump Card.

“Whenever I meet with international executives, I always go through it with them and sell it to them,” he said. “I can’t help myself.”

The White House still needs to determine crucial details about the scheme, although three months ago Lutnick claimed on the All-In Podcast that it would launch in about a fortnight.

The design of a special tax structure for Trump Card holders has yet to be finalised, and while the vetting of applicants is expected to be done by the departments of homeland security, state and commerce, Trump has not decided whether citizens of any particular countries would be excluded from applying.

The White House has banned travel to the US from a dozen nations and is reportedly considering others.

Italian billionaire and stablecoin Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino in April told the FT that the success of such visas depended on the tax treatment they afforded.

Ardoino, who has partnered with Lutnick’s former firm Cantor Fitzgerald in a crypto venture, said “the problem” with Americans is “wherever they go, they have to pay taxes in the US”.

FRESH WATER FROM SEAWATER WITH NEW TECHNOLOGY!

Instead of pumping seawater onto land, why not take advantage of the ocean’s extreme natural pressure?

The world’s largest desalination plant, in Ras al-Khair, Saudi Arabia, uses older desalination technology which requires large amounts of energy.

With the world running out of clean water, deep-sea salination is on the cusp of offering a solution from the Caribbean to the Emirates

Half of all people on earth experience severe water scarcity at least one month out of the year, according to the UN. A radical new kind of desalination technology is finally on the cusp of helping to slake the world’s thirst. The pitch: Put desalination plants on the ocean floor.

First proposed in the early 1960s, this deep-sea process would benefit from both the crushing water pressure and relatively pure seawater more than 1,000 feet down. It has been unworkable until now. Only the recent commercialization of enabling innovations— including deep-sea robots from the oil-and-gas industry, and advanced reverse-osmosis filters now standard in terrestrial desalination— make it viable.

Water scarcity is projected to become much more acute in the coming decades, owing to more extreme weather patterns, the decimation of the world’s aquifers, saltwater incursion, and growing urban populations. This threatens humanity at a fundamental level— not just because we need water to drink, but because without it there’s no food or manufacturing, and precious little electricity.

Last resort

For decades, desalination has been the only reason that many places, from the Caribbean to the Emirates, have been habitable. But it’s always been a solution of last resort, for one big reason.

“Desalination is the most expensive way to make water, and there’s no getting around it,” says Tom Pankratz, who has been in the industry for 45 years, and has consulted on many of the world’s biggest desalination projects.

Up on land, engineers would literally boil the ocean, creating steam that would become drinking water and, on its way, drive some power-generating turbines to pay back a bit of its cost. It was so energy intensive that in the 1960s, some proposed using nuclear power to do it. The world’s largest desalination plant, in Ras al-Khair, Saudi Arabia, produces much of its water through evaporation.

Around the year 2000, reverseosmosis changed everything, says Pankratz. In this process, water is forced across a plastic membrane with holes so tiny only water molecules fit through, leaving behind salt and other impurities. This process requires about half the energy, making it a credible option for Trinidad, which in 2002 got a plant that now produces 40 million gallons of water a day, and Israel, which got one in 2005 that now produces 85 million gallons of water daily. Many more plants followed, and this is now the standard way to desalinate water.

That said, it is still expensive compared with traditional water sources like reservoirs and aquifers— between about $2 and $6 per 1,000 gallons, says Pankratz. A lot of that cost depends on the price of electricity, says Eric Hoek, a professor of engineering at University of California, Los Angeles, who advises OceanWell, a desalination tech company.

There are other costs to keeping desalination plants at the ocean’s edge. Intakes can suck up marine life; outflow pipes can dump a concentrated brine hazardous to that same marine life back into the sea. These issues led California to reject in 2022 a decades- in-the-works desalination plant for water-starved Hunting–ton Beach.

Down where it’s wetter

Oslo-based Flocean, Nether–lands- based Waterise and Bay Area-based OceanWell are among the companies that seized on this idea—then submerged it to a depth of at least 400 meters.

The principle is easy to grasp: Instead of expending huge amounts of energy to pump seawater onto land, and then pressurize it inside a plant, why not take advantage of the ocean’s extreme natural pressure? At depth, seawater naturally wants to cross a desalination membrane, so long as the fresh water on the other side of it is being pumped to the surface. The result is a net energy savings of up to 40%.

There are other big advantages: These facilities can be far from shore and out of sight, so there’s no competition for beachfront property. Once in place, the systems can be scaled up without having to negotiate over real estate.

Because the process happens down so deep, the saltier brine byproduct is quickly dispersed by the ocean without harming aquatic plants or animals. And at that depth, the ocean is cleaner— free of the microorganisms, fish poop and other debris that can quickly foul a reverse-osmosis membrane.

There’s no fundamental scientific breakthrough enabling these systems, say the CEOs of all three companies, just the wider availability, lower prices and increasing functionality of deep-sea robots, undersea power cables and other technologies.

Actual customers

Despite the technology’s promise, these three companies have so far only built modest facilities to prove their value to potential customers. The deals they’re all seeking are multidecade contracts with governments. While they don’t come easily, they are the kind of customers that are necessary to turn these tech demos into actual businesses.

Both Flocean and Waterise put their pilot plants on the seabed just offshore of Norway, not far from all the North Sea drilling that produces energy for the region. Flocean is already producing ultrapure water for a local company that makes high-end cocktail ice.

OceanWell has its demo facility at a reservoir in California’s Las Virgenes Municipal Water District, not far inland from Malibu.

Flocean’s first customer will be a large offshore industrial facility

in Norway called Mongstad, which is expected to initially produce about 264,000 gallons of water a day from a single, 40-ton unit. Expected to come online in the second half of 2026, it will be the world’s first large-scale deep-sea desalination plant, says Alex Fuglesang, CEO of the company.

Waterise has announced a deal with an industrial customer, Jordan Phosphates Mines Co., to provide 6.6 million gallons of water a day desalinated deep in the Gulf of Aqaba. The company plans to begin construction later this year on its first plant capable of producing between 7.9 million and 13 million gallons a day.

That’s the goal, at least. Until some of these are actually operating at the bottom of the ocean, for years if not decades, it will be hard to know if they can make good on their promises, says UCLA’s Hoek. It’s unclear how much maintenance they’ll require, and how fluctuations in salinity and temperature might affect their performance.

History is full of ideas that worked in principle, from nuclearpowered cargo ships to solar-thermal power generators in the deep desert. Pankratz, the saltiest of industry veterans, thinks at least one of these companies will be able to set up shop in the down deep. “How close that is, and how many of these things there eventually are, is another question,” he says.

An OceanWell desalination pod. The company has a demo facility not far inland from Malibu, Calif.

FBI LIES AND LIES AND HIDES FACTS ABOUT OKLAHOMA BOMBING TRAGEDY, BIGGEST DOMESTIC TERRORIST ATTACK BEFORE 9/11

30-Year Cover-Up: Newly Unearthed Records Confirm FBI Lied about OKC Bomb Footage

‘These same RTA videotapes would show John Doe 2, the accomplice that 24-witnesses have said was in the truck with McVeigh that morning…’

Aftermath of the OKC bombing. PHOTO: FBI

(Ken Silva, Headline USA) There was a lot of news last week about the FBI suppressing evidence: Sen. Chuck Grassley alleged Thursday that the bureau has a “Prohibited Access” label to hide damning documents, while Director Kash Patel was widely criticized a day later for his dubious claims that the FBI doesn’t have footage of sex-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein’s associates abusing girls.

To top it off, an attorney suing the FBI in federal court filed a motion Friday afternoon, accusing the bureau of lying about footage in another scandalous case: the Oklahoma City bombing, which remains the deadliest domestic terrorism attack in American history.

The late-Friday motion comes from Utah attorney Jesse Trentadue, who’s been suing the FBI for records on the OKC bombing for decades. Trentadue said in his motion that a researcher he works with recently uncovered previously hidden FBI records about the bombing. Those records, unearthed by OKC bomb researcher Richard Booth, show that an agent falsely testified in court that the bureau didn’t have surveillance footage of OKC bomber Timothy McVeigh and his mystery accomplice “John Doe 2.”

“Booth did a text based search of those FBI records and discovered therein four documents proving that the Bureau is in possession of videotapes from security cameras at the Regency Towers Apartments (“RTA”) that show the destruction of the Murrah Federal Building, and Timothy McVeigh actually arming the truck bomb at approximately 8:57 am on the morning of [April] 19, 1995, when the Ryder Truck that was carrying the bomb was parked in front of the RTA,” Trentadue’s motion states.

“More importantly, these same RTA videotapes would show John Doe 2, the accomplice that 24-witnesses have said was in the truck with McVeigh that morning, but who the FBI insists never existed.”

Trentadue’s filing comes some 17 years after he initially sued the FBI for surveillance footage of the OKC bombing in 2008. His lawsuit went to trial in 2014, and the FBI vociferously argued that no footage from the RTA buildings exists. The presiding judge has yet to issue a final judgment, in large part due to allegations that the FBI tampered with one of Trentadue’s witnesses (that wild saga can be read here).

While the court continues to investigate the witness-tampering allegations, Trentadue now also wants the presiding judge to reopen his original case that went to trial, and to consider the new evidence uncovered by Booth.

According to Trentadue, the existence of new records gives him an even stronger case for the presiding judge to rule in his favor. Moreover, Trentadue said the new OKC records support Sen. Grassley’s allegations that the FBI intentionally hides FBI records by filing them under “Prohibited Access” status—meaning that they don’t appear in the bureau’s general records-keeping system.

The FBI has declined to comment on Trentadue’s case.

New Records: What do They Say?

Just eight days after the Oklahoma City bombing, an FBI agent named Jon Hersley testified in court that security footage from the top of a nearby apartment complex showed the bombers’ Ryder Truck heading towards the Murrah building minutes before the explosion.

“I believe that particular camera was located on the apartment building there,” Hersley said on the stand during McVeigh’s April 27, 1995, preliminary hearing—referring to the Regency Tower Apartments, or RTA. “I don’t know the exact location of the camera, but it kind of scans that whole area there … It scans in front of the Tower building and also over towards the parking lot.”

But when Trentadue sued for the footage nearly 20 years later, Hersley suddenly changed his tune. At Trentadue’s 2014 trial, he testified that he was mistaken in his 1995 testimony, and that the RTA camera he described didn’t exist. Instead, Hersley testified he had only seen pictures from an ATM machine’s camera that was inside of the Regency Tower Apartments.

At the time, Trentadue expressed skepticism over Hersley’s contradictory testimony.

“The testimony about this videotape given by Mr. Hersley 20 years ago just after the bombing conflicts with the testimony that he gave at this trial,” Trentadue said in a December 2014 proposed findings of facts, which he filed after the trial concluded. “The testimony given by Mr. Hersley at the [April 1995] Preliminary Hearing is the more credible.”

Fast forward another 10-plus years: OKC bombing researcher Booth has apparently proven that Trentadue was correct.

In a sworn declaration accompanying Trentadue’s Friday motion, Booth said he was tasked to search through a trove of some 1.5 million pages of documents from the FBI case file of Terry Nichols—one of McVeigh’s accomplices who helped him build a bomb, but who wasn’t in Oklahoma on the day of the attack. Booth said he found records about the Regency Tower Apartments’ security footage—records that were hidden from Trentadue and the public for decades.

The first record Booth found is an FBI report detailing an interview agents conducted with Wesley Edward Bogie, who worked security at the Regency Tower Apartments. According to the FBI report, agents showed Bogie “three still photographs taken from the RTA security camera,” which depicted McVeigh’s Ryder Truck and two individuals nearby. The significance of this report is that the footage it describes couldn’t have been from the ATM machine inside the apartment complex—it must’ve been from another camera, according to Booth.

Another record Booth found describes footage clear enough that the Regency Tower Apartment’s assistant manager was able to identify a tenant that was pictured. Again, this indicates that the footage came from a camera other than the ATM inside of the building, Booth said in his declaration.

A third record Booth found is from the FBI’s June 1996 interview of Oklahoma City Police Department Sgt. Ritchie Willis, who told agents that he recovered film from a Regency Towers security camera that “was still recording” at the time it was removed. Willis said he provided that film to FBI agent Lou Ann Sandstrom about eight hours after the bombing.

“This document is highly significant because it establishes as a fact that the tape obtained by Sgt. Willis was still recording when it was taken into custody, that the recording came from one of the RTA security cameras, that the camera depicted 5^th Street, and that it was removed from a VCR,” Booth said in his declaration.

The fourth record states that the private firm ADT Security serviced the external security cameras at the Regency Tower Apartments—another indication that such footage exists, but is being suppressed by the FBI.

“More importantly, the obvious conclusion one can draw from these documents is that the RTA videotapes contain material that the Bureau does not want people to see, namely, the still-unidentified John Doe #2,” Booth added—referring to McVeigh’s accomplice, whom the FBI initially launched a massive manhunt for, only to later claim that he never actually existed.

What Now?

In his Friday motion, Trentadue asked for the judge to reopen his case to consider the new records unearthed by Booth.

“This newly discovered evidence consists of the Bureau’s own records that were deliberately withheld from both the Court and Plaintiff,” Trentadue said.

“This evidence is also very important because it shows that the FBI did not conduct a good faith reasonable search for responsive records and, in all fairness, the Court should receive and consider this evidence especially given the FBI’s attempts to mislead the Court about the ‘search’ that was actually done in response to Plaintiff’s FOIA Request and the results of that search,” he added.

The Justice Department must now respond to Trentadue’s motion. What happens next is unclear, as Trentadue’s case is already in uncharted territory—this writer is unaware of any other FOIA case in history to go to trial, and the transparency group Judicial Watch has described the lawsuit as one of the most extraordinary FOIA cases in American history.

“We’re one of the largest FOIA litigants in this country, and we’ve never been involved in anything that involves that degree of alleged misconduct by the [FBI]. It’s astounding,” Judicial Watch investigator Sean Dunagan told this reporter in 2022.

If the judge rules in his favor, Trentadue seeks to depose FBI agents and search their physical archives to see what they did with the missing surveillance footage. But the FBI has said in court briefings that the court doesn’t have the power to let Trentadue do that—suggesting that the bureau would appeal any judgment against it.

Such an appeal could extend the litigation for years. Meanwhile, Trentadue still awaits a separate judgment in the same case, over the witness tampering allegations he made a decade ago.