TV News LIES

When not firing off social media posts threatening potential war crimes against 93 million Iranians, Donald Trump is busy quietly killing the so-called American dream. With gasoline at US$4 a gallon, credit card debt hitting a record US$1.28tn, and stagnating wages, Americans are struggling to detect the prosperity their president promised them. Regardless, Trump plans to spend a record $1.5tn on the military in 2027 – a 40% increase for the Pentagon at a time when farm bankruptcies have increased by 46%.

But if Trump’s illegal war on Iran has taught us anything, it is this: Americans will pay any price for freedom, except if it increases the price of groceries or gasoline. People in the Maga heartlands tolerated the erosion of civil liberties, democracy and the rule of law during the first year of Trump’s second presidency but they will be unforgiving if their standard of living declines.

My wife and I moved from Fremantle to New York for our careers 15 years ago, bringing our three small children with us. All of them are US citizens. But we recently took a family decision to return to Australia. To be honest, it feels like an escape.

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Clay Fuller supports the war in Iran. Shawn Harris opposes it. Voters in Marjorie Taylor Greene’s former district in north-west Georgia decided that this distinction was not enough to propel a Democrat into a conservative-leaning House seat on Tuesday night.

Associated Press called the election as results from the rural counties of north-western corner of the state rolled in.

Both men running to replace the former Trump ally turned critic, who resigned from Congress earlier this year, have considerable military credentials. Fuller is an air force reserve lieutenant colonel and military attorney. Harris is a retired brigadier general who has commanded combat troops in Afghanistan, Liberia and elsewhere, with his last active-duty assignment as a military attache in Israel.

On paper, the odds of a Harris win were slim. Georgia’s 14th congressional district voted for Trump by a two-to-one margin in 2024, which is nearly the same margin Harris lost to Greene in 2024. In line with special elections for Congress since the start of Trump’s term, the Democratic candidate overperformed. Early results suggest Harris has improved on his 2024 margin by double digits. Harris said he will try again in November with a full congressional term on the table.

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The wife of a US soldier who was detained last week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents at her husband’s Louisiana military base was released from federal custody on Tuesday.

The wife of a US soldier who was detained last week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents at her husband’s Louisiana military base was released from federal custody on Tuesday.

“All I have ever wanted is to live with dignity in the country I have called home since I was a baby,” Annie Ramos said in a statement following her release.

Ramos, a Honduran immigrant, arrived in America as a toddler. In 2005, after her family missed an immigration hearing, a removal order was issued for her, the New York Times reported.

In early April, Ramos, who is now 22, was detained days after her nuptials to Matthew Blank, 23, a US army staff sergeant who is preparing to train for deployment.

The pair had previously tapped a lawyer to aid Ramos in her path to citizenship, according to the Times. She had applied for protection from deportation in 2020 under Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca), but her application was not processed.

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Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents shot a man in a vehicle in northern California on Tuesday.

ICE agents conducted a vehicle stop in Patterson, a rural agricultural town in California’s Central Valley about 80 miles east of San Jose, to arrest Carlos Ivan Mendoza Hernandez, ICE director Todd Lyons said in a statement.

Lyons described Hernandez as a member of the Los Angeles 18th Street gang and said he was wanted for questioning in El Salvador related to a murder. Lyons did not provide evidence of that allegation. The details of that investigation remain unclear.

Hernandez was hospitalized after the shooting. A spokesperson for the Stanislaus county sheriff’s office, which has jurisdiction over Patterson, declined to comment on Hernandez’s condition.

According to Lyons, as agents approached the car, Hernandez “weaponized his vehicle in an attempt to run an officer over”.

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Democratic-backed candidate Chris Taylor is projected to win a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, expanding the court’s liberal majority, according to Decision Desk HQ. 

Taylor, an appellate court judge, defeated Maria Lazar, a conservative and fellow appellate court judge, for a seat left open by conservative Justice Rebecca Bradley, who opted to not seek reelection.

Wisconsin’s high court currently boasts a 4-3 liberal majority, expanding to a 5-2 edge with Taylor’s victory.

It’s a major victory in the state for Democrats, who only three years ago flipped the state’s high court from a conservative majority to a liberal one. 

Though Taylor was expected to win Tuesday, the election has underscored the speed with which Democrats have taken partisan control of a high court in a consequential battleground state.

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President Trump said Tuesday that he would “suspend” an escalation of attacks on Iran for two weeks as long as Iran agrees to open the Strait of Hormuz.

In a Truth Social post less than two hours before his 8 p.m. EDT deadline for Iran to make a deal to open the strait, the president said conversations with Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Field Marshal Asim Munir led to the “double sided CEASEFIRE.”

“The reason for doing so is that we have already met and exceeded all Military objectives, and are very far along with a definitive Agreement concerning Longterm PEACE with Iran, and PEACE in the Middle East,” he wrote.

Trump said a 10-point proposal was also received from Iran that is a “workable basis on which to negotiate.”

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The dead and wounded were brought to Al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital in Deir al-Balah by car, truck, ambulance, and motorized rickshaw following a brutal attack by an Israeli-backed Palestinian militia supported by airstrikes on Al-Maghazi refugee camp in central Gaza on Monday.

Inside the hospital morgue, young men wept openly as they gathered around the lifeless bodies of their relatives lying on blankets on the floor. “Don’t leave me brother,” one man screamed as he put his head on the chest of his dead relative before grabbing his limp hand and putting it to his lips in grief. At least 10 Palestinians were killed and dozens wounded in the assault, according to the WAFA news agency.

The attack began when members of an Israeli-backed militia raided the eastern part of Al-Maghazi refugee camp, multiple eyewitnesses told Drop Site News. The area was just 50 meters from the “yellow line,” where Israeli troops withdrew after the October “ceasefire” agreement, effectively cleaving the Gaza Strip in half.

“We were shocked when Abu Nasira’s forces—or the militia—entered the neighborhood and began firing at people’s homes and at the children inside those homes,” Ahmed Al-Maghari, a resident who witnessed the attacks, said in reference to an Israeli-backed militia. “Some residents of the neighborhood were forced to go out and defend the area and their community, so they began firing back at the militias that were there,” he said, adding that the area was then targeted by Israeli aircraft with multiple airstrikes.

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Saudi Arabia on Tuesday condemned the storming of the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem by Israel’s Minister of National Security Itamar Ben-Gvir.

“The foreign ministry expresses the condemnation by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and its disapproval of the unveiled storming of the compounds of the noble Al-Aqsa Mosque that a minister in the government of the Israeli occupation conducted under the protection of the occupation forces in the strongest terms,” a statement by the foreign ministry read, stressing that Riyadh rejects any continuation of the breaching of international law, attacks on the sanctity of Islamic holy sites and provocation against the feelings of Muslims around the world.

Furthermore, the statement called on the international community to put a stop to any transgression or attacks on the Palestinian people or sacred historical sites in “occupied Palestine” and guarantee respect for the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

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