Pope tells Italian police: ‘Never believe evil can prevail’; Dems are praying for economic depression; Catholic leaders in Detroit march in protest to ICE office; Somalian-Muslim running for mayor in Minneapolis, wants to ‘Trump-proof’ the city; Supreme Court allows Trump’s Education Department to resume layoffs; Polish bishop warns of ‘Islamization of Europe’; and more —
Supreme Court Allows Trump’s Education Department to Resume Layoffs
The Supreme Court issued a 6-3 ruling on Monday allowing President Donald Trump’s Department of Education to resume efforts to slash its workforce in half.
The decision reverses a lower court ruling ordering the reinstatement of Department of Education employees cut loose in mass layoffs, and ultimately allows Education Secretary Linda McMahon to continue her mission of winding down the department.
Read more at Breitbart
Autopen Scandal Deepens. Could Pardons Be Invalidated?
The so-called autopen scandal appears to be getting worse for former President Joe Biden as more information comes to light.
Biden, some of his former staffers, and a handful of thought leaders in the Democratic Party have attempted to triage the message about the inner workings of the previous presidential administration. But tangible evidence is mounting that it was effectively run like a kind of politburo.
Read more at The Daily Signal
House GOP blocks Dem maneuver to force release of Epstein files
House Republicans on Monday night voted against attaching a Democratic amendment to landmark cryptocurrency legislation that would force the Justice Department to release the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Why it matters: It’s the outcome Democrats anticipated, and one they plan to gleefully cite as President Trump continues to grapple with the MAGA fallout over the DOJ’s handling of the documents.
Read more at Axios (email registration required for full access)
What I Learned Talking with Susie Wiles, “The Most Powerful Person in Trump’s Orbit”
Andrew Walworth and Carl Cannon talk with Miranda Devine, New York Post columnist and host of the podcast “Pod Force One,” about her recent exclusive interview with White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.
Watch at RealClearPolitics (13 min)
Eat Your AI Slop or China Wins
In “Darwin Among the Machines,” a letter to an editor published in 1863, the English novelist Samuel Butler observed with dread how the technology of his time was degrading humanity. “Day by day,” he wrote, “the machines are gaining ground upon us; day by day we are becoming more subservient to them.” For the ironical Butler, the solution was simple: Kill the machines. “War to the death should be instantly proclaimed against them. Every machine of every sort should be destroyed by the well-wisher of his species.”
Read more at The Free Press
Trump Cracks Down on Colleges Giving Tuition Breaks to Illegal Aliens
The Trump administration is using a long-overlooked federal statute to crack down on states that offer in-state tuition to illegal immigrants while charging higher rates to out-of-state students who are American citizens. The move marks the first serious enforcement of a 1996 immigration law that has sat dormant for nearly three decades.
At the center of the effort is 8 U.S. Code § 1623, a provision of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996. The law plainly states that no illegal alien may receive a postsecondary education benefit “on the basis of residence within a State” unless that same benefit is made available “in no less an amount, duration, and scope” to U.S. citizens regardless of where they live.
Read more at Amac
Dem Strategist Says Party Should ‘Pray’ For ‘F*cking Depression’ To Get Out Of Its ‘Mess’
Several Democrats said that they currently have a grim outlook on the future of the Democratic Party, The Hill reported Monday.
Democratic strategist Brad Bannon told the Hill he thinks that Democrats are “still stuck in the same mud that they were in six months ago.” The report comes as the Democratic Party has been vying to win back voters they lost in the 2024 election cycle.
Read more at The Daily Caller
Senate confirms first new judge of Trump’s second term
The Senate has voted to confirm the first judicial nominee of Donald Trump’s second term, marking the resumption of the president’s longstanding campaign to install a conservative tilt across the federal judiciary.
Whitney Hermandorfer was confirmed in a 46-42 vote along party lines to replace an Obama-era appointee on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals — pushing the court which hears appeals from Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee further to the right
Read more at Politico
“Religion of Vaccinology” Must Be Stopped: Dr. Tenpenny
Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Health and Human Services has been questioning the safety and efficacy of vaccines, even replacing the entire Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), now co-chaired by Dr. Robert Malone, to review currently recommended shots.
While the progress is significant, Americans must demand accountability for pandemic crimes and focus on helping victims, explains Dr. Sheri Tenpenny to The New American’s Alex Newman for Conversations That Matter.
Read more at The Liberty Sentinel
Newsom’s Politically Dubious Defense of Pot Growers
Why does Gavin Newsom insist on playing into Donald Trump’s hands? The California governor mounted a feckless response to the riots against immigration enforcement in Los Angeles. Now he’s standing up for marijuana growers who may have been exploiting illegal immigrant workers.
Federal agents last week arrested more than 300 allegedly illegal immigrants at pot farms in the Santa Barbara area. The Homeland Security Department says Glass House Farms is under investigation for child-labor violations and 10 undocumented minors were found there. Glass House has a state license to grow marijuana and denies knowingly employing undocumented workers or minors.
Read more at the Wall Street Journal
Somalian-Muslim Omar Fateh blasted for saying he will ‘Trump-proof’ Minneapolis as he runs for mayor
The Mamdani effect has spread across the country and landed in Minneapolis. Omar Fateh, a Muslim man with Somalian heritage is a Democrat mayoral candidate for the city and, like his New York counterpart, is pushing some very controversial ideas that are putting blue blooded American offside.
Watch at Sky News Australia; see also @End Wokeness on X
Catholics led march to Detroit ICE office in protest for immigrants
Standing in front of the Detroit headquarters of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on a sunny Monday morning, the Rev. David Buersmeyer asked a security officer if he could accept a letter from Catholics asking ICE Detroit to better treat immigrants.
Judith Brooks, a fellow Catholic who advocates for immigrants, stood by the Detroit priest’s side with a sealed envelope, leaning forward to hand the letter to him. But the officer didn’t respond, slammed the glass door shut with a loud thud and then pushed on it to make sure it was secure. …
Read more at the Detroit Free Press
Catholics for Catholics beg Detroit Archbishop to ‘correct course’ on X
Dear Detroit Abp. Weisenberger, When was the last time you led a prayerful procession of the Faithful outside an abortion clinic where babies are murdered? Or at the drag queen show that targeted children? …
Aside from ending the traditional Latin Mass just weeks after arriving to your new Archdiocese, you carry the distinction of having imposed the most severe restrictions on access to the Sacraments during the Covid 19 crisis while thousands were begging for the ability to receive Our Lord without hindrance.
Your Excellency, the scandal you have caused the faithful is great. We beg you to course correct…so you can be the light you were consecrated to be.
Read @Catholics for Catholics on X
Christian village in occupied West Bank faces settler attacks as clergy urge urgent global action
Church leaders and diplomats have condemned Israeli settler attacks on Taybeh [Ephraim], a historic Palestinian Christian town in the occupied West Bank, where settlers twice set fire to the 5th-century Church of St George and adjacent cemetery while seizing olive groves for livestock grazing. The community – one of the last entirely Christian villages in the region – faces what clergy describe as systematic targeting, with its 50,000-strong minority doubly vulnerable as both Palestinians and Christians.
Representatives from 20 nations and the EU joined local leaders in demanding accountability, warning that unchecked settler violence (extending across the West Bank) threatens to erase the ancient Christian presence …
Watch at Al Jazeera (3 min)
‘Living martyr’ cardinal takes part in New Jersey exorcism conference, prays for universal deliverance
A 96-year-old cardinal who had been imprisoned by communists for 28 years shared his testimony at a July 11-12 New Jersey conference on exorcism and deliverance …
Cardinal Ernest Simoni Troshani of Albania, whom Pope Francis called a “living martyr” in 2024 … said that too often deliverance is thought of exclusively as a mode of protection from demonic possession. Instead, he said that the faithful should realize that they are also [praying] for deliverance from illness and disease …
He told all attendees to begin praying the Rosary four times a day for those possessed by demons, those suffering from cancer, and women having trouble conceiving.
Read more at Catholic Vote
Why is the Vatican’s foreign minister in India?
The Vatican announced Sunday that its Secretary for Relations with States — the equivalent of a foreign minister — had begun a weeklong visit to India.
The Vatican’s Secretariat of State said July 13 that Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher was visiting the subcontinent “to consolidate and strengthen the bonds of friendship and collaboration between the Holy See and the Republic of India.”
Read more at The Pillar
Polish bishop denounces ‘political gangsters’ and warns of ‘Islamization of Europe’ at Poland’s holiest shrine
A Polish bishop has declared, during a homily given at Poland’s holiest Catholic shrine, that the country “is ruled by political gangsters”, warning of the dangers of irregular migration which will lead to the “Islamisation of Europe”.
Wiesław Mering, bishop emeritus of Wlocławek, spoke on Sunday at the annual pilgrimage organised by the Catholic broadcaster Radio Maria to Jasna Góra monastery in Częstochowa [saying]:
“Our borders are threatened from both west and east,” said Mering, referring to a migration crisis engineered by Belarus on Poland’s eastern border and the return of thousands of illegal migrants to Poland by Germany from the west.
Read more at the Catholic Herald
Kidnapped seminarians in Nigeria: Bishop of Auchi confirms contact from kidnappers
A few days after the armed attack on the “Immaculate Conception” diocesan minor seminary in Ivhianokpodi, in Edo State, Nigeria, the attackers who kidnapped three young seminarians “contacted the Diocese of Auchi and demanded a ransom.”
The Bishop of Auchi, Gabriel Ghieakhomo Dunia, confirmed this to Fides [adding] “State Government and local security agents are working to track the abductors and get the abducted seminarians released but no success has been achieved yet” …
Read more at Fides
German Catholic Women’s Association demands Bishop Barron be stripped of Josef Pieper Prize
The Catholic Women’s Federation (KFD) of Münster has called for an immediate stop to the planned awarding of the Josef Pieper Prize to U.S. Bishop Robert Barron on 27 July, describing it as a “devastating signal” that honours views which “devalue queer people and deny women the right to freedom of conscience”.
In a detailed statement, the KFD accuses Bishop Barron of repeatedly rejecting “scientific and social understandings of gender diversity outright.” They cite comments on his Word on Fire website, where he labelled efforts to evolve Church teaching on sexuality as “absurd…a categorical error.”
Read more at the Catholic Herald
Chip & Joanna Gaines [media company owners] Face Backlash Over ‘Gay Little House on the Prairie’
The LGBT community is praising Chip and Joanna Gaines for including a same-sex couple with two young sons in their new reality television series, “Back to the Frontier.”
Queerty said the show “serves queer Laura Ingalls Wilder vibes for gay dads stepping back in time.”
“This series taps into something we’ve always believed–that stepping away from the noise of everyday life can bring you closer to what matters most,” the Christian couple said in a statement. “It is proof that no matter where you find yourself, the most important part of home is the people you share it with.”
Read more at Todd Starnes; see also Matt Walsh
Pope Leo XIV’s Hometown Purchases His Childhood Home
The village of Dolton purchased Pope Leo XIV’s boyhood home for $375,000 on Tuesday, July 8, after the village board unanimously approved its purchase at a special meeting the week before.
Newly elected Dolton Mayor Jason House said on July 10 that a steering committee would be formed in order to plan how to manage the property, which will become a historic site open to the public. He said the committee would then “lay out the plans to trustees and the community.”
Read more at the National Catholic Register
Pope at Mass: Never believe that evil can prevail, even amid injustices
As he continued his summer holidays in Castel Gandolfo on Tuesday, Pope Leo XIV presided at Mass in the chapel of the Carabinieri headquarters in the hilltop town near Rome.
“In the face of injustices that wound the social order, do not yield to the temptation to think that evil can prevail,” he said [to national gendarmerie of Italy], “Especially in this time of wars and violence, remain faithful to your oath: as servants of the State, answer crime with the force of law and honesty.”
Read more at Vatican News
