TV News LIES

Friday’s news that Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) is considering not seeking reelection inspired the type of internet callback that no political figure ever wants.

A smoke signal sent by the campaign said that Ernst will announce the decision officially next month.

Still, the report of the pending news was enough of an excuse for Ernst’s critics to remind others of the callous way she dismissed voter concerns about Medicaid cuts at a town hall in Parkersburg, Iowa, back in May.

When one woman yelled that “people will die” because of the major cuts to Medicaid and food assistance programs, Ernst snidely responded, “People are not ― well, we all are going to die. So, for heaven’s sakes, folks.”

The comments have followed Ernst ever since, even as she tried to reduce their impact in various ways.

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President Trump on Wednesday ripped a recent ruling that Utah must redraw its congressional lines as “absolutely unconstitutional” amid a growing redistricting fight across the country. 

“Monday’s Court Order in Utah is absolutely Unconstitutional. How did such a wonderful Republican State like Utah, which I won in every Election, end up with so many Radical Left Judges?” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

District Court Judge Dianna Gibson ruled that the GOP-controlled state Legislature went around safeguards against partisan gerrymandering with the latest lines and must redraw ahead of next year’s midterms. 

Under the current map, Utah’s four congressional districts are all held by Republicans. A redrawing could, depending on how lines are drawn around blue Salt Lake City, mean an opportunity for Democrats to snag a House seat in the state.

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Over two dozen Senate Democrats are demanding that the Trump administration lead an independent investigation into the killing of Palestinian American Sayfollah Musallet by Israeli settlers earlier this month, calling out the U.S. government’s historic failure to act on other Israeli killings of Americans like Shireen Abu Akleh and Ayșenur Ezgi Eygi.

In a letter sent to Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Attorney General Pam Bondi on Thursday, the lawmakers note that Israeli settler violence in the occupied West Bank has reached new heights amid Israel’s genocide in Gaza. The Trump administration has not only refused to condemn such violence, but has fueled it, empowering settler groups previously sanctioned by the Biden administration.

Since 2022, at least seven American citizens have been killed by Israeli forces or settlers in the West Bank, but the U.S. government has refused to investigate those deaths, instead deferring to Israel’s own shoddy probes into the killings.

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A group of Democratic senators and Hamilton producer Jeffrey Seller are hosting a Pride celebration at the Kennedy Center Monday evening. But the Kennedy Center has nothing to do with programming it.

Senators John Hickenlooper of Colorado, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Jacky Rosen of Nevada, Brian Schatz of Hawaii, and Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin have rented the Justice Forum, a small theater at the REACH, an expansion to the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts that opened in 2019.

While the group of senators booked the space a few weeks ago, the Pride event, called Love Is Love, was only announced on Monday. A statement from Sen. Hickenlooper's office says the event is "about standing up for the arts and the progress the LGBTQ community has made. The performance reminds us that our fight for equality — and for democracy — isn't over. It's happening right now." Directed by Seth Rudetsky and James Wesley, the show will include songs celebrating gay culture.

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A truck carrying one of the Army M1 Abrams tanks that participated in President Donald Trump's parade in honor of the service's 250th birthday struck and killed a woman in Washington.

The accident occurred on the evening of June 16 – two days after the parade – on New York Avenue while a contract truck driver was hauling the tank from the West Potomac Park staging area to a railyard in Jessup, Maryland, according to an internal Army document obtained by USA TODAY. The truck was part of a larger convoy of vehicles.

The woman, whose name was not included in the document, was alone at the time of her death.

Officers with Washington's Metropolitan Police Department responding to a call in the city's Northeast area just after 9:30 p.m. found "an adult female, unconscious and not breathing, suffering from life-threatening injuries," according to police spokesman Freddie Talbert.

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A 12ft-tall statue of John Lewis was unveiled in Georgia on Saturday morning, honoring the legacy of the civil rights leader and congressman who died in 2020.

The statue stands in Decatur Square outside the historic Decatur courthouse in outer Atlanta, in a district Lewis represented in Congress from 1987 to his death. Lewis was 80 when he died due to complications related to pancreatic cancer.

The statue replaces a Confederate obelisk that was originally erected in 1908 and was taken down in June 2020 amid the Black Lives Matter protests that spread across the country after the murder of George Floyd.

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