TV News LIES

Authorities in Tennessee have dropped a felony charge against a man who was jailed for more than a month over a Facebook post he made about the 10 September killing of the conservative activist Charlie Kirk.

Whereas many people across the US lost their jobs over social media comments about Kirk’s death, Larry Bushart’s case stood out as one of the few instances where such online speech has led to criminal prosecution.

His arrest – on a charge of threatening mass violence at a school – alarmed free speech advocates, who said the Perry county sheriff, Nick Weems, had targeted Bushart because of his political views. Bushart was released on Wednesday after prosecutors sought to dismiss the charge.

Bushart, a 61-year-old former law enforcement officer, had posted numerous memes on Facebook making light of Kirk’s killing.

More...

JP Morgan warned the US government about more than $1bn in transactions linked to Jeffrey Epstein that were possibly related to reports of human trafficking, new documents confirm.

The largest bank in the US filed a suspicious activity report (SAR) in 2019, just weeks after Epstein was found dead in a New York jail cell, about transactions linked to the paedophile financier and prominent business figures. It also flagged wire transfers made by Epstein to Russian banks.

JP Morgan’s report said it had flagged about 4,700 transactions, totalling more than $1bn, that were potentially related to reports of human trafficking involving Epstein, the New York Times reported. The report, filed during the last Trump administration, also flagged sensitivities around Epstein’s “relationships with two U.S. presidents”.

The report was included in a release of previously sealed court records that were made public on Thursday after requests from the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. The documents included other SARs that JPMorgan filed in the years before Epstein’s 2019 arrest about large cash withdrawals, the New York Times reported.

More...

A federal judge on Friday permanently blocked part of an executive order from Republican U.S. President Donald Trump, ruling that the president cannot require voters to show passports or similar documents as proof of citizenship before voting.

Several lawsuits have challenged the president’s March 25 executive order, a sweeping order aimed at overhauling federal elections, and courts had already temporarily blocked it from going into effect. U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in Washington, D.C., was the first to reach a final ruling against the executive order.

Kollar-Kotelly permanently blocked the part of the executive order that would require proof of U.S. citizenship to register to vote. The judge had previously declined to block the part of the executive order that would bar states from counting mail-in ballots received after Election Day.

More...

In a possible reprieve for millions of families on the brink of losing food aid, two federal judges have ruled the Trump administration cannot stop funding for SNAP benefits amid a protracted government shutdown. 

Regular funding for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits was due to run out on Saturday, Nov. 1. “The well has run dry,” the Agriculture Department said. 

But rulings by judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, issued within minutes of each other on Oct. 31, ordered the department to use $5.25 billion in contingency funds to continue SNAP.

More...

The Trump administration is going to restrict the number of refugees it admits into the United States next year to the token level of just 7,500 – and those spots will mostly be filled by white South Africans.

The low number represents a dramatic drop after the US previously allowed in hundreds of thousands of people fleeing war and persecution from around the world.

The administration published the news on Thursday in a notice on the Federal Registry.

No reason was given for the drop in numbers, which are a dramatic decrease from last year’s ceiling set under the Biden administration of 125,000.

The Associated Press previously reported that the administration was considering admitting as few as 7,500 refugees and mostly white South Africans.

The government memo said only that the admission of the 7,500 refugees during 2026 fiscal year was “justified by humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest”.

More...

President Donald Trump demanded that former Special Counsel Jack Smith be hauled off to jail amid the political leader’s repeated, sweeping calls for the prosecution and jailing of his perceived political opponents.

In a Truth Social post Wednesday, Trump complained that “these thugs should all be investigated and put in prison.”

He added, “A disgrace to humanity. Deranged Jack Smith is a criminal!!!” alongside an article titled, “More than 160 Republicans potentially investigated in FBI’s Arctic Frost probe, House panel says.” The piece was published by right-leaning outlet Just the News Tuesday.

Trump’s post came after Axios reported that 160 Republican figures may have been investigated amidst the FBI’s Arctic Frost probe into alleged efforts by Trump’s allies to overturn the 2020 election, according to newly released documents.

Trump followed up his calls for Smith’s arrest in a separate fiery Truth Social post Thursday.

“He is a CRIMINAL AND SHOULD BE IN JAIL. A MAJOR LOWLIFE AND FAILURE. An ugly person, both inside and out! I beat him badly, and love watching him squirm now,” he wrote.

More...