TV News LIES

The Ukrainian army was battling an attempted Russian breakthrough in the Sumy region, it said on Sunday, following reports that Moscow forcibly moved 50 people from a border village there.

This marks a renewed Russian advance in the part of the region previously largely spared from intense ground fighting since Ukraine regained land there in a swift 2022 counter-offensive.

“Fighting is currently ongoing in the village of Hrabovske,” Ukraine’s joint task force said, adding the troops were “making efforts to drive the occupiers back into Russian territory.”

It has also refuted media reports saying that the Moscow troops were in the neighboring Ryasne village.

Earlier on Sunday, the Ukrainian rights ombudsman said the enemy’s troops forcibly moved about 50 people from Hrabovske to Russia.

On Thursday, Russian soldiers “illegally detained about 50 civilians -- residents of the village of Hrabovske in the Sumy region,” ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said.

He added that they were held incommunicado in poor conditions, before the Russians “forcibly took them to the territory of the Russian Federation” on Saturday.

AFP is unable to verify the claims, and there was no official Russian comment on the matter.

However, on Saturday, the Russian army said it had captured the village of Vysoke, a few miles from Grabovske.

Sumy military administration said on Saturday it evacuated residents from the border communities in the area, who previously refused to leave, in armored vehicles.

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The Federal Communications Commission chair, Brendan Carr, admitted at a Senate hearing on Wednesday that there had been a political “sea change” and he no longer viewed the FCC as an independent agency. Commissioners, he says, serve at the pleasure of the president.

In his case, that president is Donald Trump, whose face Carr wears as a lapel pin, whose agenda he loudly embraces, and who often publicly demands that Carr censor his critics, including revoking their broadcast licenses.

Soon after Carr’s about-face, the agency quietly scrubbed references to its independence from its website.

Perhaps Carr believes in the unitary executive theory, under which agency heads essentially function like cabinet members. That’s fine. We’re not here to argue with him about administrative law. But he can’t have it both ways. You’re either an umpire calling balls and strikes or a political hack – you can’t be both.

If Carr believes the FCC is subservient to the president, then he is the last person who should be claiming the power to regulate journalists’ editorial decisions under the FCC’s “public interest” standard. By his own admission, he has every incentive to define the “public interest” in whatever manner pleases his boss.

The evidence bears this out. Data from Freedom of the Press Foundation’s Press Freedom Tracker shows that every single investigation or social media tirade Carr has launched against licensees’ speech – be it 60 Minutes’ editing of its Kamala Harris interview, Jimmy Kimmel’s remarks about Charlie Kirk’s death, or Comcast’s accurate reporting that contradicted Trump’s lies about the Kilmar Abrego García’s immigration case – has involved content that upset Trump.

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While Donald Trump’s justice department did not deliver on a legal requirement to disclose all Jeffrey Epstein-related files by Friday, one document in an otherwise underwhelming disclosure lifted the veil on authorities’ inaction – and its dire consequences for dozens of teen girls.

That document is an FBI report from Maria Farmer, a painter who worked for Epstein around 1996.

Farmer, whose sister Annie Farmer was abused by Epstein and his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell at age 16, told authorities in 1996 that the late financier “stole” nude images of her siblings.

Farmer reported Epstein’s behavior with these photographs, but the FBI has never openly recognized that she made such a report, according to the New York Times. The newspaper also noted how an internal investigation into the justice department’s handling of Epstein’s case did not mention this report.

The police report states that “Complainant [Maria Farmer] stated that she is a professional artist and took pictures of her sisters 12 and 16 yrs for her own [personal] Art Work”.

“Epstein Stole the photos and Negatives and is believed to have sold the pictures to potential buyers,” it adds.

The report also stated that Epstein requested “pictures of young girls at swimming pools” and threatened Farmer, saying “that if she tells anyone about the photos he will burn her house down”.

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The Trump administration is recalling nearly 30 career diplomats from ambassadorial and other senior embassy posts as it moves to reshape the US diplomatic posture abroad with personnel deemed fully supportive of Donald Trump’s “America first” priorities.

The chiefs of mission in at least 29 countries were informed last week that their tenures would end in January, according to two state department officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal personnel moves.

All of them had taken up their posts in the Biden administration but had survived an initial purge in the early months of Trump’s second term that targeted mainly political appointees. That changed on Wednesday when they began to receive notices from officials in Washington DC about their imminent departures.

Ambassadors serve at the pleasure of the president, although they typically remain at their posts for between three and four years. Those affected by the shakeup are not losing their foreign service jobs but will be returning to Washington for other assignments should they wish to take them, the officials said.

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The gaffe didn’t go unnoticed by critics of Kirk, who have been accusing her of capitalizing on her husband’s death in the wake of his high-profile assassination in September.

“This is the greatest Freudian slip of all time,” author Richard Hanania noted on X.

“Erika Kirk, a grift that keeps grifting,” Canadian comedian Deven Green, who portrays Mrs. Betty Bowers (America’s Best Christian) online, wrote on BlueSky.

“Erika Kirk for the win. Closes out the year as the queen of one of the all time worst Freudian slips,” attorney and documentarian Gary Douglas wrote on Threads.

Following Charlie Kirk’s death, Erika Kirk became the face of Turning Point USA, and embarked on a marathon of media appearances where she vowed to continue her late husband’s mission of promoting a nativist, fundamentalist Christian view of society.

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White House deputy press secretary Abigail Jackson and the Trump administration were called out on social media for erroneously inserting a photo of Bill Clinton, Michael Jackson and Diana Ross into the recently released Epstein files to falsely imply it showed the trio was with Epstein’s victims.

The Justice Department released a slew of documents, images and recordings related to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein on Friday after Congress passed bipartisan legislation last month forcing the release. The newly released documents included heavy redactions.

Multiple outlets, including The Associated Press and CBS, reported that dozens of the files that were previously available in the documents vanished by Saturday with no explanation from the White House, sparking accusations that President Donald Trump’s DOJ is selectively withholding information.

On Friday, Abigail Jackson posted a photo on X of the “Thriller” singer, Clinton and Ross alongside several minors whose faces appeared redacted in the image.

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The White House threatened to withhold federal funding from the Smithsonian Institution if the prestigious museum system does not submit additional documentation for the Trump administration’s sweeping content review.

In a Thursday letter to Smithsonian Institution Secretary Lonnie Bunch, Domestic Policy Council Director Vince Haley and White House budget director Russell Vought outlined the material they said still must be submitted, noting the Smithsonian’s earlier submission “fell far short of what was requested, and the overwhelming majority of requested items remain outstanding.”

The Trump administration, in August, launched a review of eight Smithsonian museums aimed at ensuring “alignment” with President Trump’s executive order “to celebrate American exceptionalism, remove divisive or partisan narratives, and restore confidence in our shared cultural institutions.”

In the Thursday letter, White House officials said funding for the Smithsonian museums is conditioned on adherence to Trump’s executive order and on compliance with the review process.

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