Month: February 2023

Authored by Wendi Strauch Mahoney via UncoverDC.com,

NewsGuard is a self-appointed misinformation watchdog. It seems to be just one more way Americans are not allowed to think for themselves…

Co-CEOs Steven Brill and Gordon Crovitz claim it is the “librarian for the internet.” Set up specifically to rate online journalistic integrity, Brill states NewsGuard provides services that “explain to people something about the reliability and trustworthiness and background of those who are feeding them the news.” Eric Effron is the organization’s Editorial Director.

Brill is a Yale graduate and lawyer who has authored multiple best-selling books and was, among other things, CEO of Verified Identity Pass, Inc., the first U.S. biometric Voluntary Credentialing Program that went bankrupt in 2009. It was the parent company of CLEAR which went back online in 2010 and then went public in 2021.

According to MintPressNews, “Crovitz held a number of positions at Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal, eventually becoming executive vice president of the former and the publisher of the latter before both were sold to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp in 2007. He is also a board member of Business Insider, which has received over $30 million from Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos in recent years.”

Crovitz’s alliances might account for the organization’s favorable 100 ratings for WSJ and the Washington Post. He is also a contributor “to books published by the American Enterprise Institute and Heritage Foundation,” which are also favorably rated by NewsGuard.

Crovitz and Brill/NewsGuard

Notable NewsGuard Partnerships

NewsGuard has partnered with Microsoft, Pfizer, the Department of Defense with a 2021 $749,387 one-year contract, the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), and the WHO using NewsGuard’s trademark “new Misinformation Fingerprints” analyst and AI cataloging tool. NewsGuard’s other products include NewsGuard, HealthGuard, and BrandGuard—which help marketers concerned about their brand safety.

Leftist “NewsGuard” is Microsoft partner. https://t.co/qfPwJNy69E

— Tom Fitton (@TomFitton) February 14, 2023

NewsGuard mentions its partnership with the WHO in August 2020 and discusses its Misinformation Fingerprints cataloging tool. The tool is essentially a database with a “unique identifier for each hoax that, when combined with the platforms’ machine learning tools, will allow platforms to identify each hoax across the entirety of their platforms.” NewsGuard describes Misinformation Fingerprints as an “extraction and cataloging” tool. It  provides “data seeds for existing AI/Social Listening tools to trace false claims across the internet and social media or can be used by human analysts to understand mis- and disinformation risks.”

NewsGuard was also a signatory in 2021 to the Code of Practice on Disinformation for the European Commission. Commissioner statements from the May 2021 announcement are below:

European Commission Statements/https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_21_2585

Microsoft was the first signatory to “provide NewsGuard ratings and labels to its users as a “middleware solution” for empowering consumers.” Microsoft licensed NewsGuard ratings and labels. They are “free of charge” to users of the Edge browser.

Search Coach is a powerful new tool that can help students learn to form effective search queries and make sense of information online. 🔎 🧑‍💻

Read what educators have to say about the impact it’s making in the classroom: https://t.co/kUcoLPgoeb#MicrosoftEDU pic.twitter.com/sV5zMUZ40a

— Microsoft Education (@MicrosoftEDU) February 9, 2023

NewsGuard Wins Contest Run by Pentagon and DoD in 2020

NewsGuard won a 2020 contest run by the “Pentagon and Department of State to offer solutions to hoaxes related to the COVID-19 pandemic.” The contest focused specifically on the “pre-bunking” of internet hoaxes. NewsGuard was also “a winner of the Countering Disinformation Challenge, a contest offered jointly by the State Department and the Department of Defense (DoD) as a part of the DoD’s National Security Innovation Network (NSIN).” NSIN is a “government program office within the Office of the Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (OSD (R&E)) that collaborates with major universities and the venture community to develop solutions that drive national security innovation.”

NewsGuard equips “defense and military personnel” with the tools to fight disinformation from foreign and domestic adversaries “in real-time.”

NewsGuard/DOD/Mil/https://www.newsguardtech.com/industries/security-and-defense/

Per the NewsGuard press release:

“As a winner, NewsGuard will receive $25,000 to conduct a pilot and will work with the State Department’s Global Engagement Center to scope and develop a test in support of the DoD’s Cyber National Mission Force. Two other companies, PeakMetrics, which offers a dashboard for tracking mentions of a topic across multiple media channels, and Omelas, which offers a product for visually mapping online information, were also named winners of the contest.”

Notably, the tech company Omelas focuses on the “actions of overt state and nonstate actors” who exert “malicious influence on the web.” Omelas regularly contributes with speeches and written submissions to influential global organizations and domestic institutions like UChicago’s Data and Democracy initiative and the UChicago Center for Effective Government, attended by the likes of Tiana Epps-Johnson with CTCL.

Teachers’ Union Signs Contract with NewsGuard in 2022

The American Federation of Teachers, with its 1.7 million members, announced its “pathbreaking” partnership with NewsGuard in January 2022 with the rollout of the “free, real-time traffic light news ratings,” a “crucial news literacy tool” for students nationwide. The announcement coincided with National News Literacy Week. They released this video on the dangers of misinformation at the time of the announcement:

Touted as a “game-changer for teachers and families drowning in an ocean of online dishonesty,” a “licensed copy of NewsGuard’s browser extension” would help students “separate fact from fiction, as we help them develop their critical-thinking and analytical skills.” AFT President Randi Weingarten gave NewsGuard glowing reviews:

“NewsGuard is a great tool in this regard. It is a beacon of clarity to expose the dark depths of the internet and uplift those outlets committed to truth and honesty rather than falsehoods and fabrications. This historic deal will not only help us steer clear of increasingly fetid waters—it will provide a valuable lesson in media literacy and a discussion point for teachers in class on what can and can’t be trusted.”

NewsGuard’s 2022 Social Impact Report

NewsGuard issued its first “social impact report” in 2022. The report championed NewsGuard’s provision of tools that would promote “online safety for readers, brands, and democracies.” Its CEOs proudly state a mission to fight false claims of “Nazis running Ukraine’s government and Americans running bioweapons labs in Ukraine,” COVID-19 misinformation, and misinformation surrounding the mid-term elections.

According to the report, “more than 938,200 people were exposed to COVID-19 vaccine myths between Oct. 2021-Feb. 2022 on social media.” The report also reveals NewsGuard’s exposure of “pink slime sites pushing Democratic propaganda in battleground states ahead of the midterm elections.”

NewsGuard 2022

What are NewsGuard’s Stated Standards and Procedures?

The NewsGuard Dashboard “helps clients access NewsGuard’s database of News Reliability Ratings and Misinformation Fingerprints through a powerful, searchable web interface purpose-built for use by businesses seeking to identify and mitigate risks from misinformation and disinformation. Users can browse NewsGuard’s ratings, get alerts about changes in the news and information environment, and stay on top of emerging false narratives and trends.”

The site issues “stoplight red/green journalistic ratings” for news sources. Influence watch describes NewsGuard as a “web browser extension that rates the trustworthiness of online news sites based on nine criteria, providing a trust score between 0 and 100.” Nine basic “apolitical criteria” for journalistic practice are outlined on the NewsGuard website. The criteria are listed in order of importance and weighted accordingly. Satire sites, platforms, and news aggregators “are given separate designations and are not scored using the nine criteria.” The nine criteria and standards for credibility are as follows:

• Does not repeatedly publish false content (22 Points)

• Gathers and presents information responsibly (18 Points)

• Regularly corrects or clarifies errors (12.5 Points)

• Handles the difference between news and opinion responsibly (12.5 Points)

• Avoids deceptive headlines (10 Points)

• Website discloses ownership and financing (7.5 Points)

• Clearly labels advertising (7.5 Points)

• Reveals who’s in charge, including possible conflicts of interest (5 Points)

• The site provides the names of content creators, along with either contact or biographical information (5 Points)

NewsGuard Ratings/0-100

According to the website, NewsGuard substantiates the basis for its ratings with “evidence and examples to back up its assessments, includ[ing] any relevant comments from the publisher, and indicat[ing] the history of the sites’ ratings.” NewsGuard employs “a team of journalists and experienced editors” who make an effort to contact publishers who might “fail” specific criteria before a rating or an updated rating is published, “ensuring a publisher[‘s] ability to reply.” NewsGuard has recently dropped its stoplight rating system and now uses its “nutrition label” exclusively.

Are Conservatives Being Targeted by NewsGuard?

According to a series of email exchanges made public by the Conservative organization PragerU, Newsguard targets conservative organizations unfairly. NewsMax, Dave Rubin, and Harmeet Dhillon also allege having been targeted by NewsGuard. Rubin says the service sums up “so much of what is wrong right now in American culture relative to big tech and government.”

NewsGuard claimed PragerU was spreading “misleading content” on its website. Sites with scores below 60 are labeled “unreliable.”

PragerU/NewsGuard Ratings

PragerU and NewsGuard Exchange Emails

The emails from 2021 between PragerU’s Chief of Staff Adrienne Johnson and the NewsGuard Co-CEOs seem to indicate PragerU was reputationally and financially damaged by a NewsGuard red rating of 57.

Notably, officials from PragerU clarified in its emails that it is not a news website, but a “nonprofit focused on producing and marketing well-researched, issue-driven educational content” featuring healthy debate from experts. As such, PragerU discloses its donations with the required IRS 990 form and does not disclose that information on its website as “required by NewsGuard.” NewsGuard disregarded the disclosure because of its standards, not because the information was unavailable.

Ep. 266 — Exposing NewsGuard with Marissa Streit | PragerU https://t.co/q4F2kN9xx4

— bill jergins (@BillJergins) February 19, 2023

NewsGuard penalized PragerU for never having “corrected one-sided claims related to COVID or hydroxy,” all of which were objectively and verifiably true. Specifically, NewsGuard challenged PragerU’s sharing of videos featuring America’s Frontline Doctors “that promoted false claims about the anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine” as a “proven cure for COVID-19.” Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin have been well-known as effective early treatments for COVID-19 since early in the pandemic but were suppressed by the government and its overly helpful legacy media partners. NewsGuard challenged PragerU’s removal of the videos because PragerU failed to publish a correction once the videos were removed.

Sadly, PragerU had removed the videos not because they were incorrect but “due to overall social media censorship on the topic.” One of the emails shows CEO Marissa Streit writing that PragerU “created an ROI analysis on our end, and we removed it rather than face the penalties of censorship.”

NewsGuards also reprimanded PragerU influencer Will Witt who stated in a video that “children aren’t actually dying from the virus.” Witt allegedly cited without attribution a “study with the statistics of children ages 0-18 who had died from COVID-19, “none of whom died.”  Witt’s statement was not far from the mark because CDC data shows that almost no healthy children have died from COVID-19.

It appears that NewsGuard may have held Witt accountable for inexact wording, not for the spirit of the claim. It is not clear from the emails whether NewsGuard upheld its promise to “ensure” Witt or PragerU had a chance to be more exact in its language or supply “feedback” for the “failed” information on its website.

At one point in the exchange, Streit asks for confirmation from NewsGuard to certify that the “removal of certain content” will “remove any negative marks on our ratings and provide us with “Green” status—a stamp of approval that should be unnecessary in America as a prerequisite to the exchange of ideas.

Streit ultimately revealed that NewsGuard held PragerU to account for “less than 0.001% of its overall content.” Even though Streit made specific good-faith efforts to reply directly to the ratings and even removed truthful content to avoid censorship, NewsGuard doubled down and persisted with its bias. Streit wrote:

PragerU Email/NewsGuard/Streit

Directors, Advisors, and Investors

NewsGuard’s directors, advisors, and investors are an interesting cast of characters. One of the investors, Publicis Groupe, is “the third largest communications group in the world.” Publicic allegedly has “shadowy ties to Saudi Arabia.” Pfizer and Bayer/Monsanto are two of its top clients. Ironically, many of the advisors/directors are former U.S. government officials, entertainment moguls, and journalists “associated with agencies known for producing false news.”

Among the advisors is Michael Hayden, former Director of the NSA and CIA, who was “the architect of George W. Bush’s secret domestic spying program.” Tom Ridge was the first Office of Homeland Security Director following 9/11. Richard Stengel “is a former senior official in Obama’s state department who once described his role as being that of ‘chief propagandist.‘”

Below are two videos with Stengel discussing his thoughts on free speech and NewsGuard’s role in the information landscape.

He says he used to be a “free-speech absolutist” but has changed his point of view as he has traveled the world. Stengel states that his travels have taught him that “Our notion of free speech is an outlier to people. The First Amendment is no longer working.”

He shares he has become more sympathetic to legislation for hate speech. “There is a design flaw in the First Amendment in the age of social media. We need to start thinking about hate speech laws.”

Authored by Jim Bovard via The Libertarian Institute,

I traveled to Hartford, Connecticut last week for a conference. It was the first time since the start of the pandemic that I had the pleasure of being pawed by TSA agents. Alas, since 2020, neither I nor the Transportation Security Administration have become corrigible.

Flying out of Washington National Airport on Thursday, I saw a special entry for the CLEAR program that enables people who pay $189 a year to skip TSA lines. I lambasted this program here back in December. Travelers stand in photo kiosks that compare their face with a federal database of photos from passport applications, drivers’ licenses, and other sources. TSA promises that its new airport regime will respect Americans’ privacy. Fat chance: TSA previously promised no traveler would be delayed more than 10 minutes at TSA checkpoints.

I stood and watched semi-frazzled travelers enter a roped-off expanse to get TSA approval for their visage.

A skinny young woman with a CLEAR t-shirt and a clipboard was standing guard at the entrance of the biometric site. She looked like a cherub with long straight red hair and a welcoming smile. Who could suspect that, as The Washington Post warned, the new system could be “America’s biggest step yet to normalize treating our faces as data that can be stored, tracked and, inevitably, stolen”?

“How soon will they be making the biometric checks mandatory?” I asked her. “I don’t know anything about that,” she replied, as if I’d asked about the surface temperature of the planet Venus.

“Do people ever complain about having to do the biometric checks?

“No, this is voluntary,” she replied with a smile wider than a Kamala Harris grimace.

She was a good Washingtonian: she could never imagine any federal agency flogging hell out of the Constitution. I considered peppering her with another half dozen questions but wanted to keep my sarcasm fresh for dealing with TSA agents. My hunch was that the redheaded cherub was not a regular reader of the Libertarian Institute.

I finished guzzling my morning coffee I fetched from home and tossed the used Gatorade bottle into the giant trash barrel at the entrance to the TSA queue. The previous time I went through a TSA checkpoint at National Airport, TSA agents got riled up because I forgot to take off my belt. That spurred an enhanced patdown, a verbal brawl, and an article I wrote that the Minneapolis Star Tribune headlined, “The World’s Most Incompetent Agency.”

Seeking to avoid another kerfuffle, I sought to comply with the TSA checkpoint regimen. I took off my boots and belt and took all the metal clutter out of my pockets. I passed through and—beep—another alarm. WTF?

A TSA agent pointed to the giant video screen on the controlled side of the checkpoint, revealing a bright yellow splotch that proved that my derriere failed federal inspection.

“That’s my wallet,” I said.

“You aren’t allowed to have that in the scanner. We have to do a patdown.”

So I’m supposed to abandon my wallet to rascals notorious for robbing travelers? More than 500 TSA agents have been fired for stealing laptops, cell phones, and other property at checkpoints and in luggage screening.

Another TSA agent shuffled up to find my terrorist contraband. This dude was in his 20s but he looked weary before his time. He explained that he would perform a supplemental enhanced patdown on my backside.

“Are you going to jam my groin?” I growled.

“No, we’re not going to do that.”

“Yeah, OK, whatever.”

He proceeded to run his hands and his TSA Terrorist Catcher Magic Wand over my thighs and butt. I refrained from muttering that he got further than I usually did on first dates long ago. He then checked the inside of my thighs and signaled I could leave. I kept my profanity in reserve for the return flight.

Coming back through Hartford on Sunday afternoon, I was chagrined to see a long line of docile folks waiting to receive TSA blessings. I entered the queue and a scrawny, 70ish guy with his right arm in a sling came in behind me. He was struggling with his carry-on bag so I guessed his arm injury was recent.

He groused that he had paid for TSA Pre-Check but they hadn’t allowed him to use it that day. TSA Pre-Check customers usually avoid Whole Body Scanners—another reminder that the entire system is a charade.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“I’m going to Washington but I don’t work for the feds.”

“Good,” he replied. He said he was going to Fort Lauderdale and I said that was a helluva friendlier place than D.C.

Over the years, I enjoy drawing out folks to see if they recognize TSA’s “security theater.” This guy got it.

I mentioned that I might have problems today at the checkpoint because TSA hates me.

“Why do they hate you?” he asked.

“Because I have flogged them in print for 20 years. Their scanners fail to catch mock bombs and weapons in 95% of the tests by undercover agents. Their explosive detection tests are so harebrained that they are triggered by hand sanitizer. The TSA chief denounced me for maligning and disparaging TSA employees.”

He smiled.

“But I don’t know why they would ever suspect me because I was a Boy Scout.”

He laughed and said he’d been a Scout as well. “But your hat makes you suspicious,” he added.

It was a bulky brown hat I’d recently picked up in Tennessee. I didn’t realize till afterwards that it was the “Bootlegger” design. I said that if I was flying out of North Carolina, my hat would fit right in. But here in Connecticut, I was screwed.

As we got near the checkpoint, I tugged off my belt and began unlacing my heavy boots. “You can go ahead of me—this will take awhile,” I told the elderly gentleman.

“No, no—you go first,” he insisted. He absolutely, positively did not want to go just before me.

As I stood waiting my cameo in the Whole Body Scanner, I heard him explain to a TSA agent that he had metal knee and hip replacements. They signaled for him to step through a side gate next to the scanner.

I ambled into the screener radiating as much disdain as I could muster on a Sunday afternoon. A TSA agent barked that my feet were in the wrong place; I had to make sure I put my socks in the cut-out drawing. Yeah, yeah…

“Hold your arms up higher,” she ordered.

That woman sounded as dumb as my high school gym teacher.

She signaled me to exit and then another agent came up with a TSA magic wand and signaled that I must halt.

“We have to check you,” a tall, spindly young guy announced.

“What was the problem?” I growled.

“The scanner alerted for something around your shoulders and upper arms.”

I have been working on my bench press lately but I didn’t think the results were that impressive.

He waved the wand and found nothing and signaled I could move along.

“What might have triggered the alert?” I asked.

“I dunno. It could have been the heavy shirt.”

Maybe they thought the wool in my shirt came from sheep that were raised by Al Qaeda in Yemen?

As I tracked down my carry-on bag and boots on the carousel, I saw a TSA agent barking orders to the old guy with the arm in a sling.

“Do you want the supplemental screening to take place here or in a private room?” the TSA agent with a vapid visage badgered him.

I was tempted to shout: don’t go in the private room! But the guy had good instincts and said on his own that he wanted the patdown in public. At least it would be videotaped if the process went to hell in a handbasket.

The agent kept going up and down the old guy with the wand, poking and prodding and repeatedly ordering him to change his posture. The man looked humiliated at being treated like a terrorist suspect in front of so many bystanders. I don’t have that reaction to extra patdowns because I don’t give a damn for the opinions of TSA agents or anyone who happily submits to their boneheaded antics. But I could tell from the expression on the guy’s face that he was shocked.

He was finally released from TSA custody and shuffled with his shoes and belts to a nearby bench. As he was putting himself back together, I came up to offer condolences.

“I think it was the sling—that’s why they targeted me,” he said.

“They could have easily checked if you had a bomb or a gun in the sling without groping you all over but they didn’t do that,” I scoffed.

He put his head down and wished me a good trip.

“As a fellow American, I’m sorry how they treated you.”

My comment seemed to stun him. But more than twenty years after 9/11, TSA has no right to continue treating Americans like convicts waiting to enter a prison shower. TSA has taken menstruating women to private rooms to force them to lower their pants to prove they are bleeding—an abuse that has spurred multiple federal lawsuits. TSA effectively claims that Americans have no constitutional rights because they “voluntarily” submit to searches for permission to fly. That legal hogwash entitles them to endlessly harass hapless citizens. 

Despite squeezing millions of butts and boobs, TSA has never caught a real terrorist. TSA should be abolished and replaced by the type of private security companies that protect European and Canadian fliers without endless BS from officialdom.

Nationwide retail theft has erupted into a $100 billion crisis. Brick-and-mortar stores have expanded theft-deterrent merchandising strategies to mitigate unprecedented losses for companies. 

In New York City, 34th Street Partnership, a non-profit retail trade group serving Midtown retailers, hired a security firm that provides K-9 units equipped with handlers, the New York Post reported. 

Earlier this month, the K-9 program was launched at the CVS at Eighth Avenue and West 34th Street. The pharmacies have been plagued with thefts. 

“We’ve had a lot of complaints. A lot of shoplifting occurs in drugstores,” said Kevin Ward, the vice president of security for the 34th Street Partnership.

La nueva arma contra hurtos en las tiendas de la calle 34 de Manhattan, donde los robos han aumentado casi 60%. El grupo 34th Street Partnership dice que son muy efectivos y han evitado 27 hurtos en menos de un mes 🐶 pic.twitter.com/PRPLUtQHE4

— Peggy Carranza (@PeggyCarranza) February 24, 2023

“It’s effective so far,” said Ward. He added, “We’ve had a couple of people who were known shoplifters who saw the dog and walked out without stealing anything.”

Between Feb. 15-19, K-9 units prevented at least 25 thefts at the CVS stores. Here are some examples of how the K-9s are visible deterrent shields for stores (list provided by NYPost):

• On Feb. 15: a homeless man attempted to leave the store with unpaid items in the morning. He dropped the goods and fled after being approached by the security officer and the K-9.
• On Feb. 16: Two known serial shoplifters entered the vestibule of the store — but left without entering after seeing the K-9 and guard.
• On Feb. 17: A man attempted to leave the store without paying for two boxes of Tums and three bottles of juice that morning. The manager alerted the guard and K-9, and the thief returned the items when approached.
• On Feb. 19: A homeless man attempted to steal a carton of orange juice along with a container of fruit salad, but returned the goods after management alerted the K-9 and security, who confronted him.

The canine patrol is a pilot project as desperate retailers in Midtown grapple with out-of-control shoplifting. There were more than 1,000 theft complaints last year versus 2021. 

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

Just when you thought that the Kyle Rittenhouse case was over . . . it is back.

Gaige Grosskreutz who was shot in the arm by Kyle Rittenhouse during the Kenosha riots in 2020 is now suing him as well as Wisconsin police and officials.

Grosskreutz effectively repeats his earlier rejected claims that he was merely trying to protect others and had his hands up when Rittenhouse shot him.

The difference is that this civil lawsuit will be resolved under the lower standard of proof by a preponderance of the evidence (rather than beyond a reasonable doubt). Nevertheless, the case could prove messy for Grosskreutz whose criminal background and actions that night could undermine his claims.

Indeed, the most damaging witness against Grosskreutz may prove to be himself.

The lawsuit names as defendants Rittenhouse, the city of Kenosha, Kenosha County, five other neighboring counties, police officers, former Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth and former Kenosha Police Chief Daniel Miskinis. Grosskreutz alleges assault, battery, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Rittenhouse was also added to Grosskreutz’s civil rights and Equal Protection claims against the city and local officials.

In the trial, Grosskreutz admitted that he pointed a firearm at Rittenhouse before the then-teenager shot Grosskreutz and two others. He testified that he carried a loaded gun that night and, during cross-examination, defense attorney Corey Chirafisi asked Grosskreutz, “It wasn’t until you pointed your gun at him, advanced on him … that he fired, right?” Grosskreutz responded, “Correct.”

Grosskreutz also admitted that he refused initially to answer questions from the police and refused to give police permission to look through his phone. He also did not tell police that he was armed that night or pointed a gun at Rittenhouse. As shown in the testimony below, Grosskreutz admits that Rittenhouse did not shoot while Grosskreutz had his hands up. He fired when Grosskreutz pointed his Glock at Rittenhouse.

Grosskreutz also admitted that Rittenhouse told him that he was going to the police and was running in their direction. He also admitted that he lied to police when he said that he tried to tell a man with a skateboard to stop hitting Rittenhouse before he was shot. The false statement to police portrayed Rittenhouse as shooting him after he tried to help him.

The complaint repeatedly brushes over that earlier testimony and reframes the facts as if Grooskreutz was shot virtually randomly:

“Plaintiff Gaige Grosskreutz watched all of this happen.

He approached with his hands in the air to try to ease the situation and stop the killing. 27. Defendant Rittenhouse instead shot Mr. Grosskreutz in the bicep, leaving a gaping wound.

Thankfully, Mr. Grosskreutz did not die that day.

…

Plaintiff Gaige Grosskreutz approached Defendant Rittenhouse with his hands up, pleading with him to stop his shooting rampage. Without provocation or any legal justification, Defendant Rittenhouse shot at Grosskreutz from point-blank range, hitting him in the arm. Thankfully, Grosskreutz survived.”  But he must live with the physical and emotional wounds inflicted by Defendant Rittenhouse and the Defendants who deputized and enabled him. The conduct of the Defendants in this case directly caused Gaige Grosskreutz’s injury.”

Grosskreutz also admitted that it was him on his cellphone footage who angrily yelled at Rittenhouse to go home as Rittenhouse tried to give masks to protesters. He admitted that did not see any violent acts or threats from Rittenhouse before the shooting.

Grosskreutz also admitted his CCW permit was invalid and that he was therefore illegally carrying a concealed weapon on the night, though he insisted that he did not know it was invalid.

Grosskreutz was also questioned on the stand about his seeking $10 million in a lawsuit against the city and another lawsuit in federal court for damages. He admitted that he did not mention in the two filings that he was armed at the time. He also admitted in trial that a conviction of Rittenhouse would help him secure the $10 million.

It is not clear how he will get around that admissible earlier testimony. Instead, the complaint seems more of a diatribe against the police who it alleges “deputized these armed individuals, conspired with them, and ratified their actions by letting them patrol the streets, armed with deadly weapons, to mete out justice as they saw fit.” The problem is that these individuals had a right to carrying guns. Indeed, Grosshreutz also came to the protest armed.

The complaint also alleges that Rittenhouse was linked to right-wing white nationalist and militia groups, noting that a member of the so-called Boogaloo Bois was seen “patrolling the streets” with Rittenhouse that night, and that he later met with Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio. It also states that “in the months after he killed two people and maimed Mr. Grosskreutz, Defendant Rittenhouse was seen in a bar in his hometown flashing an ‘OK’ sign, a symbol of white supremacy/white power.” Such evidence would be challenged by the defense as prejudicial and inadmissible at trial.

There is also likely to be fight over the admission of Grosskreutz’s criminal history, which was not fully admitted at the criminal trial. That criminal history extended a full decade before the Kenosha shooting and involved violence against his girlfriend. Indeed, just days before the shooting, Grosskreutz was arrested for allegedly “prowling” when he was videotaping police vehicles in a police department parking lot around 1 a.m.

In May 2015, Grosskreutz was stopped by police near Kenosha with allegedly “bloodshot and glassy” eyes and found to have a 9mm Glock 19 handgun in his vehicle.

In 2013, he was charged with smashing the bedroom window at a former girlfriend’s home at 4 a.m.. The girlfriend alleged that he had been harassing her.

In 2012, Grosskreutz was charged with a felony burglary charge in New Berlin when he was caught trying to sell three stolen PlayStation consoles.

In 2010, Grosskreutz was arrested and charged with hitting his grandmother in the face during a dispute. During the attack, he also alleged threw a lamp and damaged a wall. He was charged with disorderly conduct and criminal damage.

He also reportedly had various sealed juvenile arrests.

The lower standard of proof will obviously work to the advantage of Grosskreutz, but it will be hard to get around his prior testimony or the image of him pointing the Glock at Rittenhouse before the teenager fired, wounding him in the arm.

Rittenhouse is also facing a lawsuit by one of the men shot on that night. A federal judge ruled that the lawsuit by the family of Anthony Huber could go to trial. Huber, 26, struck Rittenhouse with his skateboard before Rittenhouse shot and killed him.

Here is the complaint: Grosskreutz v. Rittenhouse

Here is Grosskreutz’s earlier testimony:

Authored by Jamie Joseph via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Big Bear Mountain—home to one of Southern California’s premiere ski resorts tucked in the San Bernardino National Forest—received more snowfall this week than it normally receives in a year, according to a spokesperson for the resort.

During the week, snowfall exceeded more than 100 inches—the retreat’s yearly average—resort spokesman Justin Kern told The Epoch Times on Friday.

“We’ve passed that mark this week,” he said.

The sudden deluge comes as Southern California faces its first blizzard warning since 1989, beginning Feb. 23, for much of the region. Officials and resort personnel alike have been warning residents not to travel up the mountain until the advisory is set to expire after the weekend.

However, the resort remained open during the day on Friday with only a cancellation of its night operations.

Kern said some roads heading up the mountain, like State Route 330, are closed off. While other roads may be open with traction requirements, like Highway 38 to Mentone or Highway 18 to Lucerne Valley, the resort is encouraging people not to come until the storm clears, especially since the average Californian is not used to driving in this kind of weather.

“Our primary concern is just making sure that people are traveling to and from the mountain safely,” Kern said. “This is not the time to start learning how to drive in the snow.”

All vehicles, including those with four-wheel drive and snow tires, must have chains, Kern said.

Meanwhile, on the mountain—which is projected to get up to 8 feet of snow from this storm—those who already had reservations in the town’s lodges could be seen snowboarding and skiing on Friday. The resort is keeping an eye on strong gusts of wind, which could result in ski lift closures.

Additionally, the Bear Valley Unified School District canceled classes Thursday and Friday for “snow days,” due to hazardous driving conditions.

A Rare Storm

The unexpected snowfall comes as mountains in several counties—Los Angeles, Ventura, San Bernardino, and Santa Barbara—all fell under blizzard warnings on Thursday. The National Weather Service warned these mountains would experience “heavy snow, winds gusting up to 80 mph, and near zero visibility.”

National Weather Service meteorologist Andrew Orrison said there’s a “unique combination” of what’s causing this winter phenomenon across Southern California.

“It’s a combination of it being a very cold storm and it’s slow-moving, and because of it being slow-moving, it has time to bring in a lot of moisture from the Pacific Ocean,” Orrison told The Epoch Times. “And the persistence of that feed of moisture off the Pacific Ocean coupled with the fact that this is a very cold system is really what’s driving the very heavy snowfall totals.”

The impacts of the storm, Orrison said, are concerning to forecasters, as the resulting blizzard conditions will be dangerous and could potentially cause power outages.

And while the blizzard warning is supposed to end by Saturday, there’s a possibility it could be extended, he said, as heavy snowfalls coupled with strong winds could be “near hurricane force.”

“It definitely is an extreme event, because of the way this has come together,” he said.

Shortly after noon on Friday, Vineland Avenue in North Hollywood adjacent to the Hollywood Burbank Airport was flooded, trapping at least five cars. Subsequently, a flash flood warning was in effect through 10 p.m. Friday in inland parts of Los Angeles and Ventura Counties. Weather experts warned earlier in the week that flooding was likely to occur.

“As a reminder, if you see flooded roads, TURN AROUND, DON’T DROWN! You can’t tell how deep the water is and you (and your vehicle) can be swept away,” the National Weather Service in LA wrote on Twitter Friday.

Orrison said this storm system—what he calls an atmospheric disturbance—is different from typical winter storms in California, which are often associated with so-called atmospheric rivers. Unlike those storms, this system came down from the north and is stronger, but colder. As a result, snowfall is occurring at lower elevations and even in some valley areas, including near the Pacific coast.

One popular state landmark at a lower elevation that saw light snowfall yesterday morning was the 45-foot Hollywood sign, sitting at about 1,600 feet on the southern slope of Mount Lee in the Santa Monica Mountains.

It was a rare sight to see, Hollywood Sign Trust Chairman Jeff Zarrinnam told The Epoch Times.

“I was surprised,” Zarrinnam said. “I walked outside my door yesterday and I see snow on the ground, and I said, ‘Well, I’d better make a snowball and take a picture with the sign because that never happens.’”

Authored by Jeff Lopuderbeck via The Epoch Times,

On taking the stage in the East Palestine High School auditorium on Feb. 24, environmental activist Erin Brockovich told a crowd mostly composed of local residents dealing with the aftermath of a toxic train derailment she was “here with a message you don’t want to hear but maybe you know.”

“Superman is not coming. Nobody is coming to change what has happened to you, magically fix everything, or give you all of the answers,” Brockovich said. “You will become the strongest advocate you have.

“You have the ability to become—and you will become—your own critical thinker,” Brockovich added.

“You will vet information. You will ask questions. You will demand answers.”

Brockovich cautioned audience members that there will not be a swift resolution to the issues that now impact East Palestine and surrounding communities.

“You want to be heard, but you’re going to be told it’s safe, you’re going to be told not to worry,” Brockovich said.

“That’s just rubbish, because you’re going to worry. Communities want to be seen and heard.

“This is not going to be a quick fix. This is going to be a long game,” she added.

Environmental activist Erin Brockovich speaks at a town hall in East Palestine, Ohio, on Feb. 24. (Jeff Louderback/The Epoch Times)

An overflow crowd of more than 2,000 gathered in this village of 4,761 near the Pennsylvania border to hear Brockovich speak, with more than 100 media members covering the event.

Brockovich was joined by water expert Robert W. Bowcock and trial attorney Mikal Watts. They are the principles of East Palestine Justice, an organization of lawyers, environmental activists, and scientific and medical professionals providing assistance to eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania residents affected by the derailment.

On Feb. 3, a 151-car Norfolk Southern Railway freight train derailed in East Palestine.

When the train crashed, 38 rail cars derailed, and a fire ensued which damaged an additional 12 cars, according to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).

“There were 20 total hazardous material cars in the train—11 of which derailed,” according to an NTSB statement.

Environmental activist Erin Brockovich (C-R) speaks to concerned residents as she hosts a town hall at East Palestine High School in East Palestine, Ohio, on Feb. 24, 2023. (Michael Swensen/Getty Images)

Fears escalated in the immediate aftermath of the wreck. Seeking to avoid an explosion that officials claimed would send shrapnel into the air, vinyl chloride was intentionally released and burned on Feb. 6, sending a massive cloud of black smoke into the sky that could be seen for miles around and was likened to a mushroom cloud caused by a nuclear weapon.

The burn triggered questions about the health effects that could potentially impact the residents of East Palestine.

Vinyl chloride, a chemical used to make PVC pipes and other products, has received extensive attention as part of the emergency. The National Cancer Institute notes that vinyl chloride has been linked to cancers of the brain, lungs, blood, lymphatic system, and liver.

Other rail cars contained ethylene glycol monobutyl ether, ethylhexyl acrylate, isobutylene, and butyl acrylate, which are all used in the making of plastic products.

Officials from federal and state agencies have repeatedly said that tests show the air and water are safe in East Palestine and surrounding communities. However, residents continue to report headaches, vomiting, burning eyes, skin rashes, and other ailments.

“I’ve never seen anything in 30 years like this and the situation happening in East Palestine,” Brockovich said.

“You all know the story about digging the hole and draining the chemicals in there and lighting it on fire,” she added. “I don’t think that turned out well for anybody.”

Brockovich said she traveled to East Palestine after receiving numerous emails from residents who requested her presence.

“I feel your angst and I feel your frustration. And I want to share something with you: You are not alone,” she said. “It feels like every community I’ve been going to for 30 years gets the same run-around, and you don’t get clear information.

“You own this narrative, not an agency that wasn’t here, and certainly not Norfolk Southern,” Brockovich added. “You know how you feel. You know if you’re sick. You know if you smell something. You know if the water’s a funny color.”

Communities confronted with an environmental disaster can handle the truth, Brockovich added, “but what they can’t handle is being misled and lied to.”

At that moment, the auditorium’s lights turned off, promoting Brockovich to say, “That is how we feel—in the dark—and in the dark, we will continue to talk.”

…

Read more here…

Authored by Brian Wilson via AmericanThinker.com,

Remember that famous recurring line from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid?

Worse than the Pinkerton agents to Butch and Sundance, Cloward and Piven are to the stability and future of America.

If the Cloward-Piven Strategy is new to you, Fred Elbel’s  “Cloward–Piven strategy – fundamentally transforming America” does an outstanding job breaking it down into bite-size pieces.

Basically:

[D]eveloped in 1966 by Americans Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven — both sociologists and political activists…

…[t]he strategy focused on overloading the United States public welfare system in order to precipitate a crisis, which would ultimately lead to replacing the welfare system with a national system of “a guaranteed annual income and thus an end to poverty.”

It worked pretty well – so well, in fact, the outline has been applied in many instances to bring about the disruption of public programs, policies and systems:

• 1965 Immigration Act

• 2008 Financial Crisis

• 2014 Border crisis — Unaccompanied Alien Children

• 2015 Syrian refugees — importing terrorism

Time marches on and the Cloward–Piven strategy, as Elbel puts it, “remains an active instrument of change in America.  Ultimately, it is the tool by which multicultural elites aim to “fundamentally transform America.”

To fully appreciate the genius of the strategy, just look around at the other pressure points of American society being clogged and hamstrung by the nonstop avalanche of C-P red tape.

The southern — and now northern — borders are beyond overwhelmed.  Border Patrol agents are taken away from the flood of illegals and reassigned to paper-pushing, babysitting, and chauffeuring gigs.  And the flood continues unabated.

As the immigrant invasion continues — over 5 million by current estimates — local support structures and systems are overwhelmed: schools, housing, law enforcement, retail outlets are unable to cope.  The damage is not reserved to the systems.  Visit a local hospital E.R.  And not just in towns in Texas, Arizona, Oklahoma, and California.  Identical issues around the country are similarly effected as “got-aways” and exported aliens make their way to Chicago, New York, Miami, L.A., San Francisco.  All those cities already had overcrowding problems left over from the COVID-19 “pandemic.”  Crime stats are skyrocketing, primarily in Democrat-governed cities and blue states.

Food shortages are ubiquitous.  Baby formula to Brussels sprouts to ground meat to eggs continue to run in short supply as prices rise.  Suspicious fires, bombings, and “accidents” at food processing plants are blamed without explanation along with droughts, avian flu, and the dreaded (supposed) COVID-19 super-duper “sub-variants.”  Government regulations reducing the application of certain fertilizers on farms in Holland, Spain, France are proliferating, forcing crop, flock, and herd reductions.  Results: farms closing, creating more food shortages, unemployment, and increasing welfare rolls.

Public outcry and political pressure have been suppressed through ignorance caused by the media.  The MSM’s OCR (Obsessive Compulsive Regurgitation) of the most salacious to the most dramatic to the most irrelevant “news of the day” leaves no air time for hard news stories and continuing tragedies that will inform the affected about the coming tragedies of system collapse.

Meanwhile, politicians continue to focus on J6, laptops, classified docs, name-calling, distractions, denials, Harry and Meghan, and similar matters irrelevant to the preservation of liberty, erecting a fog bank over the news and information the public needs.  People sufficiently talented to get themselves elected can whistle and chew gum simultaneously.  But the analogy is lost on the blow-dried celebrity news media set.

Don’t presume that the C-P strategy can’t — or doesn’t — work both ways.  What if the internals of the bureaucratic deep swamp work in harmony with the overwhelming external pressures by slow-walking the very administrative solutions to the problem?

Overall, that’s been the plan all along.  Proven effective over decades, Cloward-Piven remains the strategy “multicultural elites are using to fundamentally transform America.” 

Nothing good can come of it.  It’s rotten to the core.

The European Union has rolled out with fresh sanctions on Russia, which comprises the 10th package, marking one year since the Ukraine invasion. “New EU sanctions over Russia’s war in Ukraine adopted on Saturday target 121 individuals and entities, including Iranian drone manufacturers, officials said,” AFP writes.

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen described this latest round of EU measures as “the most far-reaching sanctions ever — depleting Russia’s war arsenal and biting deep into its economy.” She added: “We are also turning up the pressure on those trying to circumvent our sanctions.”

This was announced in tandem with wealthy G7 nations saying they are preparing new major sanctions:

Earlier, Britain and the United States separately imposed new sanctions including export bans and tariffs on all materials used in the war, as well as “third country actors” supporting Russia’s war effort across Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

The G7 groups Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain and the United States. The same group came together last year hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine, imposing the first round of a series of sanctions.

Representing the current G7 presidency, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Friday that “Russia is refusing to change their hardline stance.”

“The international community must come together and show solidarity and impose strong sanctions against Russia,” he added.

However, some ‘global south’ countries which represent a huge chunk of the globe’s population have been resistant: 

India, which has maintained a neutral stance on the conflict, does not want the G20 to discuss additional sanctions on Russia. G20 officials told Reuters it was also pressing to avoid using the word “war” to describe the conflict in G20 communique language.

Recall the last time CNN tried to shame India’s Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas over refusing to sacrifice India’s national interest for the sake of ‘punishing’ Russia…

“Let me correct the perspective: 1) India only bought 0.2% of Russian oil 2) India buys in a quarter of what Europe buys in one afternoon” – STRONG 💪🏼 response by India’s Minister of Petroleum H.E. @HardeepSPuri to CNN’s Becky today. pic.twitter.com/JeLrGm3Bgx

— حسن سجواني 🇦🇪 Hassan Sajwani (@HSajwanization) October 31, 2022

So it clearly won’t be so easy to get these “third country actors” on board after all.

Authored by Lear Zhou via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Jennifer Siebel Newsom, the wife of California Governor Gavin Newsom, has been criticized for allegedly making a profit by screening her “gender justice” films to public school children.

The scrutiny comes from a nonpartisan government watchdog group called Open the Books, which claimed that “Siebel Newsom spent years laying the ideological groundwork and political infrastructure to support her policy ambitions,” in a research report published on Feb. 13.

CEO and founder of Open the Books Adam Andrzejewski told NTD, a sister media of The Epoch Times, that his organization found out about Siebel Newsom’s alleged scheme by “following the money.”

Andrzejewski said they followed it “right into the governor’s wife’s … public charity, which is a film and curriculum nonprofit organization that licenses her films and curriculum to public schools across the country and in the state of California.”

The First Lady of California’s nonprofit organization “The Representation Project” was founded in 2011. It has produced four films, all advocating for gender or racial justice.

Siebel Newsom is the producer and director of the films. Andrzejewski said the secret is that “she hires her for-profit film production company to contract with her nonprofit film distribution company.”

Siebel Newsom’s for-profit company, Girls Club Entertainment, has received $1.6 million from The Representation Project since 2012, the report stated.

She also earned $1.5 million in salary from the nonprofit company from 2013 to 2021, which means she has personally received $3 million in profit, according to Andrzejewski.

In the health education framework for California public schools issued in 2021 by the State Board of Education, Siebel Newsom’s nonprofit films and curriculum are recommended.

In the summer of 2022, Gavin Newsom convinced the state legislature to pass a budget providing $4.7 billion for K–12 mental health services, which, among other things, funded 10,000 new school counselors.

“The Mask You Live In,” one of the films produced and directed by Siebel Newsom, would warn “teachers in the classroom that when they show the film and walk students through the curriculum, they should have therapists on hand,” Andrzejewski said, and this became one of the main argument points for Gavin Newsom to convince the state legislature.

The film features porn website addresses, and the pornographic images displayed are tagged with descriptions such as “domination,” “kinky couples,” etc.

The movie claims it will show “how we, as a society, can raise a healthier generation of boys and young men” and will help “shape the national conversation around healthy masculinity.”

However, Andrzejewski said, “This incredibly gives students a roadmap to see this stuff for future exploration outside of the classroom.”

“This is exactly what parents across the entire country should be scared of that their children are seeing in their public school classrooms,” he said.

Besides the sexually explicit imagery shown in two of the four films, lessons that include Marxist ideology and critical race theory are being taught in classrooms, Andrzejewski said.

“This is a classroom very physically divided between those that are, quote unquote, oppressed and those that are, quote unquote, privileged,” said Andrzejewski.

He said Gavin Newsom stars in two of the four films Siebel Newsom made.

“In the curriculum, students are asked to vote for politicians that espouse the same views as her husband, Gavin Newsom,” Andrzejewski said. “We think it’s an on-its-face conflict of interest.”

NTD has reached out to The Representation Project for comment but has not received a response as of this writing.

NTD reporter Jackie Rios contributed to this report.