A new study has found that human populations may need a fertility rate of at least 2.7 children per woman — far higher than the long-accepted 2.1 — to reliably avoid long-term extinction.

The research, published April 30 in PLOS One and led by Takuya Okabe of Shizuoka University in Japan, challenges decades of demographic assumptions, Phys.org reported. Using mathematical models, the team examined how variations in fertility, mortality, and the likelihood that some adults never reproduce can significantly increase the risk of population decline — even when a society meets the traditional “replacement level” birth rate.

SUPPORT LIFENEWS! If you want to help fight abortion, please donate to LifeNews.com!

“Considering stochasticity in fertility and mortality rates, and sex ratios,” co-author Diane Carmeliza N. Cuaresma said, “a fertility rate higher than the standard replacement level is necessary to ensure sustainability of our population.”

The study highlights how smaller populations are especially vulnerable to these random demographic shifts, which can gradually eliminate entire family lineages. A slight increase in female births appears to mitigate this risk, possibly explaining why more girls tend to be born during times of extreme conditions such as war, famine, or upheaval — a phenomenon long noted by evolutionary scientists.

While the researchers do not predict imminent collapse for large developed nations, they caution that most individual family lines, along with their cultural and linguistic heritage, are likely to fade over time unless fertility rates rise.

LifeNews Note: Rachel Quackenbush writes for CatholicVote, where this column originally appeared.

The post Researchers Say Human Population at Critically Low Levels, Need More Babies to Survive appeared first on LifeNews.com.

The country’s most popular party has denounced the designation as “a severe blow” to democracy

Germany’s domestic intelligence agency has officially designated the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) as an “extremist” party. The designation comes despite the AfD leading national opinion polls.

In a statement on Friday, Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) said that the AfD exhibits numerous signs of a party acting against the free democratic basic order while accusing it of “disregarding human dignity.” The assessment was made based on an “intensive and comprehensive expert review” of the party’s activities, including its affiliations and statements by party members.

At the core of the decision is what the agency described as the party’s “understanding of people predominantly based on their ethnic descent.” According to the BfV, AfD leaders promote policies that exclude German citizens with migrant backgrounds – particularly Muslims – from full societal participation. The report also flagged the party’s use of terms such as “knife-wielding migrants” and its attribution of violent tendencies to non-European ethnic groups.

“The continuous incitement against refugees and migrants… promotes the spread and deepening of prejudices, resentment, and fears,” the BfV concluded.

AfD co-leaders Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla have condemned the decision. “Today’s classification is a severe blow to German democracy,” they said in a joint statement. “The AfD is the strongest party in current polls… Nevertheless, the AfD, as an opposition party, is now being publicly discredited and criminalized shortly before the change of government.”

Meanwhile, outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz warned against any hasty decisions regarding imposing any restrictions on the party. “I think this is something that cannot be rushed into,” Scholz said when asked about banning the AfD outright.

The BfV’s statement comes after a new Forsa poll released last month indicated that the AfD has 26% support, ahead of Germany’s Christian Democrats (25%) and the Social Democratic Party of Germany (15%). The AfD has continued to gain traction amid voter dissatisfaction with mainstream parties and rising concerns over immigration and the economy.

Despite the high level of support for the AfD indicated by polls, the federal election two months ago was won by the Christian Democrats, who signaled that they had no intention of cooperating with right-wing parties.

President Trump has announced his first judicial nominee of his second term and she fought in court to defend an abortion ban that saves babies.

Trump announced late Thursday night that he would nominate Whitney Hermandorfer to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit. She is his first federal judicial nomination since returning to the White House in January.

Hermandorfer heads up a litigation unit for the Tennessee Attorney General’s Office. In that role, she has led major cases involving constitutional law – including defending the state’s abortion ban in court from a challenge from the Planned Parenthood abortion business.

SUPPORT LIFENEWS! If you want to help fight abortion, please donate to LifeNews.com!

As LifeNews reported last April, Hermandorfer countere arguments from the abortion giant, which said that it shouldn’t face any limits on abortions or oversight from the state when it comes to killing babies. Hermandorfer said that’s not how that works.

The Tennessee Attorney General’s office argued in front of a three judge panel and asked the judges to dismiss a lawsuit filed against the ban by abortion activists seeking to weaken it.

“Plaintiffs very much, and this is a shared policy view by many in the medical profession, do not want any sort of governmental scrutiny on their use, on their medical decision-making,” Hermandorfer explained. “And that’s not been how things have worked in the abortion context.”

Those behind the lawsuit wanted to be able to kill babies in abortions just because they’re disabled.

Trump praised his judicial nominee, saying she would uphold the rule of law.

“Whitney has been serving the Great People of Tennessee, in the Attorney General’s Office, where she has strongly litigated in Court to protect Citizens from Federal Government Overreach,” Trump wrote on Truth Social,” praising her accolades and prior clerkships with prominent originalist justices.

Trump noted Hermandorfer previously clerked for Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Amy Coney Barrett, as well as then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh on the D.C. Circuit and U.S. District Judge Richard Leon.

“She has a long history of working for Judges and Justices who respect the RULE OF LAW, and protect our Constitution,” said the president.

The post Trump’s First Judicial Nominee of 2nd Term Defended Abortion Ban in Court appeared first on LifeNews.com.

Separate provisions outline Kiev’s “indefinite obligations” and bypass parliamentary ratification, Irina Gerashchenko has claimed

The US-Ukraine minerals agreement announced this week “hides” details of Kiev’s “indefinite obligations” to Washington, a Ukrainian lawmaker has claimed.

In a Facebook post on Friday, Irina Gerashchenko, a member of European Solidarity party said the deal includes two “secret,” supplementary documents that will not be subject to parliamentary ratification.

The minerals deal reportedly grants the US preferential access to Ukrainian mining projects in exchange for assistance with an investment fund to support the country’s reconstruction. Initially portrayed by Washington as repayment forbears of military support – estimated at $350 billion by President Donald Trump – the final text, published on Thursday by the Ukrainian government, states that only future aid will count toward US contributions to the fund.

Gerashchenko claimed however that instead of one agreement, the US and Ukraine signed three.

“The Zelensky government has not provided deputies and society with all the agreements signed in the US, which, as it turned out, are three, not one,” she wrote. “Meanwhile, they want to ratify only one framework document in the Verkhovna Rada. Others are labeled ‘implementation documents,’ despite the fact that it is in these two secret agreements that all the technical details of indefinite Ukrainian obligations are hidden.”

Ukrainian Prime Minister Denis Shmigal “avoided” commenting on the two documents and the lack of security guarantees in the published agreement – reportedly a key point of contention during negotiations – Gerashchenko told the country’s parliament on Friday.

The claim has raised questions among Ukrainian lawmakers and the public on the actual scope of the agreement. MP Yaroslav Zheleznyak claimed on Telegram that, when pressed, Shmigal acknowledged the two additional documents but downplayed them as “technical” and exempt from ratification. The texts “must be signed after the ratification” of the main agreement, Shmigal claimed, noting that lawmakers would see them when the Ukrainian negotiating team returns from the US next week.

READ MORE: US-Ukraine deal ‘important step to end war’ – Rubio

Western media reports have also noted the existence of additional documents and claimed that a last-minute dispute arose when Washington demanded Kiev sign all three. Ukrainian officials reportedly argued they could not sign the annexes until the main agreement was ratified in Parliament. Later reports suggested all three documents were ultimately signed.

Further details about the contents of the supplementary documents have not been publicly released, and the Ukrainian government has not issued an official statement addressing their existence or content.

Today marks the one-year anniversary of the enforcement of Florida’s Heartbeat Act. This piece of legislation signed by Governor Ron DeSantis in April 2023 protects preborn children in Florida after six weeks’ gestation. Supporters of legal abortion were quick to oppose the law, placing Amendment 4 on the November 2024 ballot.

The amendment would have placed legal abortion in Florida’s state constitution. However, strong vocal leadership by DeSantis and pro-life leaders around the Sunshine State played a key role in the defeat of Amendment 4 this past November.

Even though Florida’s Heartbeat Act is only one year old, very solid data from the state show that is has already saved thousands of lives. Even though the Heartbeat Act was in effect for only part of 2024, the number of abortions performed in Florida fell by over 12,000 that year. Furthermore, recent birth data provide additional evidence that the Heartbeat Act has saved lives. The number of babies born in Florida from December 2024 to March 2025 has increased by 1,700 since the equivalent period a year ago. This means that the Florida Heartbeat Act is saving over 400 babies every month.

SUPPORT LIFENEWS! If you want to help fight abortion, please donate to LifeNews.com!

Overall, this adds to the body of research that shows that heartbeat acts reduce the incidence of abortion and save lives. Data from Texas show that after a heartbeat act there took effect in September 2021, the number of abortions performed in the Lone Star State immediately fell by over 60 percent. Furthermore, three separate studies analyzing Texas birth data have shown that the Texas Heartbeat Act has resulted in over 1,000 more children being born every month. Overall, Governor DeSantis, Florida Republicans, and Sunshine State pro-life leaders deserve credit for their efforts in both enacting and defending Florida’s Heartbeat Act.

LifeNews Note: Michael J. New is an assistant professor at the Busch School of Business at The Catholic University of America and is an associate scholar at the Charlotte Lozier Institute. Follow him on Twitter @Michael_J_New

The post Florida Heartbeat Law Saves 12,000 Babies From Abortions During Its First Year appeared first on LifeNews.com.

The US has reportedly shared data with the UK and other group members, citing alleged off-planet Chinese and Russian threats

The US has begun sharing its “most sensitive” military intelligence on China’s and Russia’s space operations with the UK and other members of The Five Eyes (FVEY) global intelligence group, The Times has reported, citing a senior commander within the US Space Force.

Until this month, the work of Space Delta 9, a unit focused on America’s orbital warfare, was largely meant only for US officials with top-secret security clearance.

However, in a move that a Space Delta 9 spokesman described to The Times as “momentous,” British military chiefs have been allowed to observe operations at the unit's base in Colorado.

The other Five Eyes members, Australia, New Zealand and Canada, have also been allowed access to the highest levels of US space intelligence, the British daily reported on Wednesday.

The Times attributed the development to Beijing and Moscow allegedly developing “new space capabilities,” such as dual use satellites, and orbiters designed for both civilian and military applications.

”We have to be ready for that fight that nobody wants to have,” Colonel Ramsey Horn, commander of Space Delta 9, told the paper. He went on to claim that the unit is “more ready” than ever to engage in combat in space.

The US Defense Department has accused China of stockpiling anti-satellite weapons, raising concerns over what it describes as Beijing’s increasing emphasis on space warfare. Chinese officials have rejected the claims and argued that militarization of space by the US poses the real threat to global stability.

Washington has made similar allegations against Russia, suggesting that Moscow may possess covert anti-satellite systems, potentially with nuclear capabilities. The Kremlin has dismissed the claims as baseless attempts to deflect attention from America’s own military ambitions in space.

READ MORE: US greatest threat to space security – China

Both Russia and China have consistently stated their opposition to the weaponization of space and have advocated for keeping space a domain reserved for peaceful use.

The UK mainstream media has puffed up British military might and fortitude since the war in Ukraine began. Now it turns out that Britain would struggle to send 5000 troops to Ukraine in a so called “deterrence force.” Policy thinkers in Whitehall desperately need to engage their brains and reach for peace.

In a remarkable turn of events, the Times Newspaper of London published an article of 29 April in which it said Europe would struggle to put 25,000 troops on the ground in Ukraine. This from the same newspaper that offered a bizarre eulogy just eighteen days ago about Britain’s “crucial role” in directing Ukraine’s failed counter-offensive in 2023.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer has actively sought a role for himself, bringing divergent US and European policies closer on the conduct of the war and on plans for peace. To much fanfare, at the March 2 Lancaster House Summit, he announced a “coalition of the willing.”

The idea emerged that such a coalition might deploy a peacekeeping force to Ukraine after a future ceasefire. Among other things, this force – comprising European and not American troops – would “defend a deal in Ukraine” and “guarantee peace afterwards.” Many meetings were held since that time, in Paris and in London, to explore the details.

The coalition had four objectives. To keep military aid flowing into Ukraine and apply further pressure on Russia through sanctions, to maintain Ukraine’s sovereignty and participation in peace talks (an obvious point), to boost Ukraine’s defensive capabilities after a peace deal and to deploy the so called ‘coalition of the willing’ to maintain the peace.

No one, including Starmer, has articulated a clear strategy to guide these objectives. On the contrary, they seem to underpin a continuance of the war, not its cessation.

If we look at them in turn, keeping military aid flowing into Ukraine and applying more sanctions on Russia will most likely prolong the war, not end it. No one has articulated what the incentive would be for Russia to sue for peace on the basis on the further militarisation of Ukraine, and in the face of additional sanctions. This objective has clearly been driven by the Ukrainian side. Economically, barely a day goes by without Zelensky, Yermak or someone else in the Ukrainian power vertical calling for more sanctions on Russia, at a time when the US press for an end to the conflict. Indeed, Ukraine was calling for more sanctions on Russia in the days before the war’s commencement. On many occasions, I have presented analysis showing how Russia has constantly found ways to adapt to sanctions and illustrated how more sanctions would have no significant economic impact. Like giving Ukraine more weapons, sanctions would only disincentive efforts at peace, by emboldening Russia to continue fighting.

Even a casual observer might note that the plan to boost Ukraine’s defensive capabilities after a peace plan would amount to wholescale rearmament, running counter to any longer-term peace process. In any case, no one has explained why this rearmament would be needed. Surely, if peace is the way forward, then both sides would gradually and in small steps stand down their forces and reduce their alert state. I wouldn’t suggest that Ukraine dissolves its army on day one. However, with 800,000 personnel, Ukraine already has a bigger army than any other European NATO ally except for Turkey.

Further, Ukraine has received over one hundred and twenty billion dollars of military aid in the three years since the war started, that’s not far short of Britain’s annual defence budget for two years. What additional defensive capabilities would they need? And, more importantly, who would pay for it? The USA categorically isn’t going to pay for this for at least the next four years under President Trump.

The European Union will almost certainly fail in its bid to boost its own defence spending by $800bn under von der Leyen’s Rearm plan. That would impose such massive spending increases on countries like France and Italy that it would be political suicide domestically for their governments to do so. Ukraine already cannot afford to keep its military at its currently bloated size after war ends, without massive injections of European money that simply isn’t available. Where will the money come from to rearm Ukraine? Answer, nowhere.

Which brings us back to the peacekeeping, or deterrence force idea, and the shocking revelation that European nations including Britain don’t even have enough available troops to deliver upon that commitment at any scale. In March, in the afterglow of the Lancaster House Summit, even Conservative politicians hailed Starmer as a modern-day Winston Churchill, standing up against tyranny in Europe. A quick reminder here that Winston Churchill oversaw the mobilisation of almost six million British troops to fight in World War II. Starmer is struggling to muster five thousand for Ukraine.

The idea of a European peacekeeping force in Ukraine has always, in any case, been a non-starter given Russia’s long-standing and expressed rejection of the notion of NATO forces on the line of control. When Russia pointed this out, and following pressure from the US government on Britain, the peacekeeping proposal was watered down to a “deterrence force.” The idea here was that, rather than being close to the line of control, coalition of the willing troops might deploy to far away spots in the west of Ukraine, just in case they were needed, to deter a theoretical Russian breach of any peace deal. Today, if any European troops can be spared, then they would only deploy to deliver training to Ukraine’s army.

This state of affairs is beyond embarrassing. We have fallen all too frequently in Britain into the habit of serving up policy soundbites for a willing pro-war media establishment, before getting our policy thinking in order. We do this before discussing our plans with the Americans, who are in the driving seat in the west on plans for peace in Ukraine. At no time, do we appear to assess the risks associated with our ideas, or consider the likely and, in almost every case, entirely predictable Russian response. Nor, perhaps, even engage in dialogue with Russia to negotiate the art of the possible, exploring scope from both sides to reach compromise. A proposal that President Macron should act as Europe’s point person with President Putin has come to nothing. Instead, we stumble, with great self-importance, from one idiotic idea to another, announcing them at every stage as huge breakthroughs in our collective resolve to defeat Russia. Until the moment, finally, when, with not even an ounce of self-awareness, we admit that, upon reflection, it won’t work.

Surely, now, we must find someone in Whitehall to engage their brain, pull on their grown up trousers, engage with both sides to the conflict, and finally reach for peace?

Reprinted with permission from Strategic Culture Foundation.

“One of the most essential branches of English liberty is the freedom of one’s house. A man’s house is his castle.”
—James Otis, Revolutionary War activist, on the Writs of Assistance, 1761

What the Founders rebelled against—armed government agents invading homes without cause—we are now being told to accept in the so-called name of law and order.

Imagine it: it’s the middle of the night. Your neighborhood is asleep. Suddenly, your front door is splintered by battering rams. Shadowy figures flood your home, screaming orders, pointing guns, threatening violence. You and your children are dragged out into the night—barefoot, in your underwear, in the rain.

Your home is torn apart. Your valuables seized. Your sense of safety, demolished.

But this isn’t a robbery by lawless criminals.

This is what terror policing looks like in Trump’s America: raids by night, flashbangs at dawn, mistaken identities, and shattered lives.

On April 24, 2025, in Oklahoma City, 20 heavily armed federal agents from ICE, the FBI, and DHS kicked in the door of a home where a woman and her three daughters—all American citizens—were sleeping. They were forced out of bed at gunpoint and made to wait in the rain while agents ransacked the house, confiscating their belongings.

It was the wrong house. The wrong family.

There were no apologies. No compensation. No accountability.

This is the new face of American policing, and it’s about to get so much worse thanks to the President Trump’s latest executive order, which aims to eliminate federal oversight and empower local law enforcement to act with impunity.

Titled “Strengthening and Unleashing America’s Law Enforcement to Pursue Criminals and Protect Innocent Citizens,” the executive order announced on April 28, 2025, removes restraints on police power, offers enhanced federal protections for officers accused of misconduct, expands access to military-grade equipment, and nullifies key oversight provisions from prior reform efforts.

Trump’s supporters have long praised his efforts to deregulate business and government under the slogan of “no handcuffs.” But when that logic is applied to law enforcement, the result isn’t freedom—it’s unchecked power.

What it really means is no restraints on police power—while the rest of us are left with fewer rights, less recourse, and a Constitution increasingly ignored behind the barrel of a gun.

This isn’t just a political shift. It’s a constitutional unraveling.

These aren’t abstract freedoms—they’re the bedrock of the Bill of Rights: the Fourth Amendment’s shield against warrantless searches, the Fifth Amendment’s promise of due process, and the First Amendment’s guarantee that we may speak, protest, and petition without fear of state retaliation.

Yet the build-up of the police state didn’t begin with Trump. What he has done is seize upon decades of bipartisan failure—and strip away the last remaining restraints.

For years, under both Republican and Democratic administrations, policing in America has grown more militarized, aggressive, and unaccountable. At times, there were modest attempts to rein in the worst excesses—like curbing the flow of military surplus equipment to local police—but these efforts were short-lived, inconsistent, and easily undone.

Trump’s executive order doesn’t just abandon those reforms. It bulldozes the guardrails. It hands law enforcement a blank check: more weapons, more power, and fewer consequences.

The result is not safety. It’s state-sanctioned violence.

It’s a future in which no home is safe, no knock is required, and no officer is ever held accountable.

That future is already here.

Just a few days before Trump signed the order, that reality played out in Oklahoma City when ICE, FBI, and DHS agents stormed the wrong home and terrorized a mother and her daughters.

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident.

In the 30 years since the first federal Crime Bill helped militarize local police forces, the use of SWAT teams has exploded. What was once a rare tactic for hostage situations is now used tens of thousands of times a year, often for nonviolent offenses or mere suspicion. These raids leave behind broken doors, traumatized children, and, too often, dead bodies. And yet, when families seek justice, they’re met with a legal wall called qualified immunity.

Under this doctrine, courts excuse even blatant misconduct by law enforcement unless an almost identical case has already been ruled unconstitutional. It’s legal sleight of hand—a get-out-of-jail-free card for government agents who trample on the Constitution.

We’ve entered an era in which federal agents can destroy your home, traumatize your family, and violate the Fourth Amendment with impunity. And the courts have said: that’s just how it works.

More than 80,000 SWAT raids now occur annually in the United States, most of them for nonviolent offenses like drug possession or administrative code violations.

Many are botched. Few are ever investigated.

In Martin v. United States, now before the Supreme Court, a heavily armed FBI SWAT team mistakenly stormed a Georgia home—armed with rifles, clad in tactical gear, and deploying a flashbang grenade—causing the family inside, with a 7-year-old son, to fear they were being burglarized.

The agents were supposed to raid a gang suspect’s house. Instead, they relied on faulty GPS and ended up at the wrong address, a block away from the intended target.

Only after detaining the family—forcing one family member onto the bedroom floor at gunpoint, and then pointing a gun in the mother’s face—did the officers realize their mistake.

The Rutherford Institute, alongside the National Police Accountability Project, filed an amicus brief urging the Court to deny qualified immunity for the agents. But if history is any guide, justice may prove elusive.

Just last year, the Court refused to hold a SWAT team leader accountable for raiding the wrong house, wrecking the wrong home, and terrorizing an innocent family.

In Jimerson v. Lewis, the SWAT team ignored clear differences between the actual target house and the Jimerson residence—missing house numbers, architectural mismatches, a wheelchair ramp where none should have been—and still received qualified immunity.

These rulings aren’t exceptions—they reflect a growing doctrine of unaccountability enshrined by the courts and now supercharged by the Trump administration.

Trump wants to give police even more immunity.

Brace yourselves for a new era of lawless policing.

President Trump’s call for a new crime bill that would further insulate police from liability, accountability and charges of official misconduct could usher in a new era of police brutality, lawlessness and the reckless deployment of lethal force on unarmed civilians.

This is how the rights of ordinary Americans get trampled under the boots of unchecked power.

Even when SWAT commanders disregard warrants, ignore addresses, and terrorize innocent families, the courts shield them from consequences.

These SWAT raids have become a thinly veiled, court-sanctioned excuse to let heavily armed police crash through doors in the dead of night. Too often, they’re marked by incompetence, devastation, and death—leaving a trail of broken homes and broken lives, while law enforcement escapes accountability.

There was a time in America when a person’s home was a sanctuary, protected by the Fourth Amendment from unlawful searches and seizures.

That promise is dead.

We have returned to the era of the King’s Writ—blanket search powers once used by British soldiers to invade colonial homes without cause. As James Otis warned in 1761, such writs “annihilate the privilege” of privacy and due process, allowing agents of the state to enter homes “when they please.”

Trump’s new executive order revives this tyranny in modern form: armored vehicles, night raids, no-knock warrants, federal immunity. It empowers police to act without restraint, and it rewards those who brutalize with impunity.

Even more alarming, the order sets the stage for future legislation that could effectively codify qualified immunity into federal law, making it nearly impossible for victims of police violence to sue.

This is how constitutional protections are dismantled—not in one dramatic blow, but in a thousand raids, a thousand broken doors, a thousand courts that look the other way.

Let’s not pretend we’re safe. Who will protect us from the police when the police have become the law unto themselves?

The war on the American people is no longer metaphorical.

Government agents can now kick in your door without warning, shoot your dog, point a gun at your children, and suffer no legal consequences—so long as they claim it was a “reasonable” mistake. They are judge, jury, and executioner.

With Trump’s new order, the architecture of a police state is no longer theoretical. It is being built in real time. It is being normalized.

It’s not just the poor, the marginalized, or the criminalized who should be afraid. It’s every homeowner, every parent, every citizen who still believes in the Bill of Rights.

Nowhere is this threat more visible than in the unholy alliance between ICE and militarized police forces.

This is where the danger deepens: when ICE and SWAT join forces, no one is safe.

This is more than just a problem of policing—it’s the convergence of two of the most dangerous arms of the modern security state: the merging of federal immigration enforcement with militarized domestic operations, creating a volatile blend of ICE lawlessness and militarized SWAT-style brute force.

Together, they’ve created a government apparatus that acts first and justifies itself later, if at all.

What used to be separate spheres—immigration enforcement and local policing—have now, under the pretense of national security, merged into a seamless operation of nighttime raids, heavy weaponry, blacked-out uniforms, and unmarked vehicles.

Armed federal agents, often operating in plainclothes and without clearly presented warrants, storm homes in the dead of night.

The distinction between a SWAT raid and an ICE operation has disappeared.

ICE agents—often masked, plainclothes, and operating without judicial oversight—are executing aggressive home invasions indistinguishable from SWAT team raids. These officers operate in secret, detaining individuals without clear warrants, sometimes without charges, and often without informing families of where their loved ones have been taken.

This alliance of ICE and SWAT has turned the American home into a battlefield, especially for those deemed politically inconvenient or “suspect” by the state.

These raids aren’t limited to those suspected of crimes.

Legal residents, asylum seekers, and even U.S. citizens have found themselves disappeared under vague claims of national security or immigration violations.

It is policing by fear and disappearance. And it runs counter to everything the Bill of Rights was designed to prevent: punishment without trial, surveillance without suspicion, and power without accountability.

When ICE agents armed with military-grade equipment conduct predawn raids alongside SWAT teams, with little to no accountability, the result is not public safety. It is state terror. And it’s exactly the kind of unchecked power the Constitution was written to prevent.

The Constitution is supposed to be a shield—especially the Fourth Amendment, which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures. But in this new reality, the government has nullified that shield.

All of America is fast becoming a Constitution-free zone.

What started as an exception—the so-called Constitution-free zone at the border—is fast becoming the norm across America, where due process is optional, and law enforcement acts more like a domestic army than a public servant.

The government no longer needs to prove its authority in court before violating your rights. It only needs to assert it on your doorstep—with flashbangs and rifles at the ready.

The only castle left may be the one you’re willing to defend.

The Founders knew the dangers of unchecked power. That’s why they gave us the Fourth Amendment. But rights are only as strong as the public’s willingness to defend them.

If we allow the government to turn our homes into war zones—if we continue to reward police for lawless raids, ignore the courts for rubber-stamping abuse, and cheer political leaders who promise “no more handcuffs”—we will lose the last refuge of freedom: the right to be left alone.

As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, the Constitution cannot protect you if the government no longer follows it—and if the courts no longer enforce it.

The knock may never come again. Just the crash of a door. The sound of boots. And the silence that follows.

Reprinted with permission from the Rutherford Institute.

Excluding Moscow’s representatives from commemorations of the defeat of the Nazis shows a problem with elementary logic and basic decency

Eighty years ago, Germany suffered its worst self-induced military – as well as moral, political, cultural, you name it – catastrophe ever.

First, Nazi Germany led the global fascist challenge that we call World War II. Then, Germany was not merely defeated but crushed by the combined efforts of, in order of importance, the Soviet Union, the US, and UK, to name only those powers that really mattered decisively for the outcome of the war in Europe. This Allied victory in Europe is celebrated in May. In the West, the commemorations peak on the 8th and in Russia, one day later.

In Asia, things were different. World War II started earlier – in July 1937, not September 1939, and ended later – in August, not May, 1945. Regarding the war in Europe, the West has always, with varying intensity, sought to diminish the preponderant role of the Soviet Union – and within the latter, of Russia.

Concerning the war in Asia, the West’s main target of this weaponized forgetfulness has been China, rightly labeled “the forgotten ally” by historian Rana Mitter. China, like the Soviet Union and now Russia, has always dared challenge Western hegemony and especially US ‘primacy’. And, as with Russia and the former Soviet Union, it is this geopolitical independence that has led the West to deny the Chinese people’s real and massive World War II contribution and sacrifices, which were enormous (the death toll alone, to quote only one figure, is estimated at 12-20 million).

But for now, back to the European part of the war. There, in historical reality, it was the Soviet Union that did the most – by far – to destroy Nazi Germany. And that is a simple, even quantifiable historical fact. Merely a decade ago, it was occasionally admitted even in Western mainstream media, such as America’s Washington Post and Britain’s Independent.

A few figures suffice to sketch just how predominant the Soviet share in the victory over Nazism was: Over the course of the war, in all its theaters, 17 to 18 million Germans served in the Nazi forces (including the Wehrmacht and the smaller but especially important and vicious Waffen-SS).

At least 4 million German soldiers were killed in the fight against the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1945 alone. Estimates indicate that at least as many were injured, probably more; around 3 million became POWs.

The upshot of this is simple: A massive chunk, some historians estimate up to 80%, of the total German fighting manpower of World War II – not only those who invaded the Soviet Union – was eliminated on what the Germans called the Eastern Front. Without going into easily available details, the picture is similar when we focus not on men but materiel.

Ask, for instance, Google’s Gemini AI in Deep Research mode, and it will sum it up thus: “It is evident that the Eastern Front absorbed the vast majority of Germany’s total tank losses throughout the war.” It turns out that the failure of Germany’s touted Leopard tank in the Ukraine conflict has a long tradition reaching back to Nazi Germany’s Panthers and Tigers: Russia, neutering German cats since 1941.

Put simply, as with Sweden’s Gustav XII and France’s Napoleon, it was Russia and the Soviet Union that broke Hitler’s back. And at enormous cost and sacrifice: Current, solid figures put Soviet losses (military and civilian combined) at 26-27 million. (Compare, for instance, with the US: Military casualties, according to Encyclopedia Britannica, just over 292,000; civilian losses were negligible, even if every individual death is, of course, tragic.)

And now it is Germany – of all places – that has marred the run-up to this year’s May anniversary with an embarrassingly ugly scandal. Its essence is a German government attempt to crudely instrumentalize the commemorations to make them serve the propaganda war that has been part of the West’s proxy war in Ukraine, while accusing Russia of doing just that. In Germany, more and more often, every accusation is a confession, as they say about Israeli propaganda.

While similar initiatives have occurred for years, this year, the German Foreign Office – still mismanaged by Annalena ‘360-Degrees-of-Russophobia’ Baerbock – has escalated the pettiness by circulating a so-called Handreichung – officially, a sort of advice; unofficially, nasty arm-twisting – to insist that neither Russian nor Belarusian representatives should be invited to commemoration events and that, if they dare show up anyhow, they should be kicked out.

The barbaric call to, in essence, kick out well-behaved diplomats as if they were brawlers at a pub, is encoded as a reference to ‘house rules’ to be enforced. But this is a shamelessly primitive euphemism, about as Teutonically klutzy as when the German authorities used to disappear their opponents into ‘protective custody’.

The German mainstream media have mostly, once again, supported this harebrained and bigoted attempt to stick it to the Russians, as is fashionable again in the new-old Zeitenwende Germany of massive re-armament and ‘war fitness’ (Kriegstuechtigkeit – a term Nazi-infowarrior-in-chief Joseph Goebbels also used). As always, Ukrainian representatives have done their best to misuse their always willingly available German media platforms to confirm Germans in their errors.

The German parliament has followed the Foreign Office and demonstratively excluded Russian and Belarusian diplomats from its commemorations. At least some of the heads of commemoration sites and museums are obeying the Foreign Office’s advice, or perhaps pursuing the same policy out of their own provincial dogmatism. Christian Wagner, who is responsible for sites in Thuringia, has explicitly barred Russian and Belarusian diplomats. Likewise, the head of commemoration sites in Brandenburg, Axel Drecoll, has boasted of disinviting the Russian ambassador and of being ready to evict him – in cooperation with the ‘security forces’ – if he tries to attend.

The good news is that there is resistance as well. Around the town of Seelow – a region with special importance because of the immense 1945 Battle of the Seelow Heights – local politicians, including from Sarah Wagenknecht’s leftwing BSW, the centrist SPD, and also the mainstream-conservative CDU party, dared show themselves “astonished” by the Foreign Office’s “absurd” ideas.

When Russian Ambassador Sergey Nechayev did attend a commemoration event, no one asked him to leave and – surprise, surprise – nothing terrible or scandalous happened. That’s because Russians, unlike quite a few Germans, it seems, still know how to behave with decency.

To the credit of many other Germans, in Seelow, the ambassador was welcomed by a crowd showing their support and respect. Nechayev also took part in commemorations in Torgau, where Soviet and US troops famously met toward the end of the war, and later, at the site of the former camp of Sachsenhausen, which was liberated by the Red Army in April 1945. There, as well, the hysterical fantasies of Germany’s Foreign Office proved simply irrelevant.

In the Berliner Zeitung, songwriter and author Hans-Eckardt Wenzel sharply criticized the policy of weaponizing the memory of World War II against Russia. In particular, he took Axel Drecoll to task, challenging him, in effect, to stop his attempts at rewriting history.

The German Foreign Office, meanwhile, has shown cold feet. It has begun to equivocate in a comically dishonest and self-revealing manner. When challenged about his ministry’s gratuitous initiative against Russian and Belarusian representatives, its spokesman, Sebastian Fischer, outdid his usual stonewalling: The Foreign Office’s circular, he said, is not a prohibition because the individual memorial sites and museums retain the right to decide whether to follow it or not.

Yes, sure, and we know from Hollywood that the Pirate Code is not really legally binding but more like, you know, sort of a recommendation. Russia has long pointed out that Western elites have become so habitually underhanded, so addicted to sophistry and casuistry that they are no longer ‘agreement-capable’. Thank you for selflessly illustrating, Mr. Fischer from the Foreign Office, that this collapse of a minimum of good faith holds true not only in their behavior abroad but at home as well.

In reality, it is obvious that – despite Fischer’s transparent weaseling – the Foreign Office issued its directive to exert political and public-opinion pressure and do its worst to compel other institutions. To now discover that no one really meant to give orders is a cheap cop-out. But let’s be fair, for Germany, it’s at least a new one: From ‘I was just following orders’ to ‘We never really meant to give any.’ And they say Germans have learned nothing from their nasty past!

In the same press conference, Fischer also failed to answer a crucial question: His ministry has argued that Russian and Belarusian representatives should be kept away and even kicked out if they dare show up in order to prevent any nefarious political instrumentalization.

Yet, when reminded that similar concerns have been voiced for years now and asked to provide concrete examples of anything of the kind actually happening, Fischer drew an embarrassing blank. He mumbled something vague about some St. George’s ribbons – and that was it, all he could come up with. This from a strangely high-ranking spokesman for a country that has never really had an issue with quite a few of its new Ukrainian friends displaying stuff that is by any reasonable reckoning much worse, namely Nazi-style – and often just straightforward-Nazi – symbols. Talk about instrumentalizing the memory of World War II!

It was left to a member of the German parliament from the Alternative for Germany party (AfD) to speak some plain truth: Steffen Kotre pointed out that it is, actually, Germany’s “ideological policy” that “is instrumentalizing history.” For those out to “clobber the Russians ideologically,” the real history of World War II does not even matter. Exactly!

It is not a pretty picture: The German authorities have revealed, once more, just how small-minded, historically illiterate, and fanatically Russophobic they are. The same politicians who have never failed to support Israel’s routine instrumentalization of the German crime of the Holocaust to cover for Israel’s own brutal crimes of apartheid and genocide against the Palestinians, have shown that they see Russia as a legitimate target of what can only be called memory warfare by dirty tricks.

Of all countries, it is Russia, the one that – objectively, quantifiably – did the most to rid the world of the Nazism that Germans made, served, and fought for, which some Germans now feel they have to censure and offend demonstratively. Germany’s elites have serious problem not merely with memory but with elementary logic and basic decency.

Congressional Republicans are putting together legislation that would defund America’s biggest abortion business.

According to a new Fox News report, House Republicans are discussing a measure that would defund Big Abortion, including both the Planned Parenthood abortion chain as well as other companies that kill babies for profit.

The defunding is part of a package of legislation the House is considering to cut at least $1.5 trillion in spending and it follows on the heels of House Speaker Mike Johnson saying he wants to use reconciliation to defund Planned Parenthood.

“We are working on a lot of different options, but that’s been discussed,” Committee Chairman Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., told Fox News Digital when asked directly about Planned Parenthood. “Yeah, it’s been discussed.”

Click here to sign up for pro-life news alerts from LifeNews.com

Reconciliation is a budgetary process that allows both the House and Senate to pass a major piece of financial legislation with just a majority vote – normal in the House but helpful in the Senate because it’s not subject to the filibuster Senate Democrats would typically use to block pro-life legislation.

Planned Parenthood received $699.3 million in taxpayer funding fiscal year and carried out 392,712 abortions in its 2022-2023 fiscal year, according to its most recent annual report.

The Speaker of the House says he’s fully on board with taking away taxpayer dollars from America’s biggest abortion chain, but the House would need the votes to do it. With a very narrow Republican majority and no pro-life Democrats that’s easier said than done.

Still, Johnson said he would like to defund the abortion giant and is working to build the votes to do it. Likely, the only way that can be accomplished is via a reconciliation bill — which both the House and Senate can pass on a majority vote margin.

“I would like to. That’s for sure,” Johnson said in an interview on Fox News’s “The Story with Martha MacCallum,” when asked whether he plans to axe the two organizations.

“Yeah,” Johnson said, when MacCallum clarified whether he wants to cut spending to the organizations, adding, however, that, “We got to build consensus to have the votes to do that.”

“Now, some of this will be done by executive order out of the White House. He has a broad authority to do a lot of that,” Johnson said, referring to President-elect Trump. “But where Congress is involved, that’s where it takes the hard work of legislating and getting everybody on the same page.”

Despite the U.S. Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey on June 24, 2022, Planned Parenthood aborted five percent more unborn children during the 2022-2023 fiscal year than the previous year and brought in more than $2.9 billion in assets.

In the recently released 2022-2023 fiscal year annual report titled, “Above & Beyond,” Planned Parenthood states it performed 392,715 abortions. That means Planned Parenthood killed 1,075 babies in abortions every single day even though the abortion giant claims its main focus is merely “women’s health care.” In other words, Planned Parenthood kills 44 babies every hour.

Despite the fact that the High Court ruled there is no right to an abortion on a federal level, Planned Parenthood continues to make profit from abortions its top priority.

“Above & Beyond” also shows that 34 percent of Planned Parenthood’s revenue, $699.3 million, comes from “government health services reimbursements and grants,” or taxpayer dollars.

Taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood surged $65.9 million after Joe Biden took office in 2021, even as inflation and a slow economic recovery from the artificial COVID shutdowns eroded Americans’ real income.

The post House Republicans Putting Together Legislation to Defund Planned Parenthood appeared first on LifeNews.com.

Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein were spies who used underage sex to blackmail politicians

https://www.the-sun.com/news/116819/ghislaine-maxwell-and-jeffrey-epstein-were-spies-who-used-underage-sex-to-blackmail-politicians-ex-handler-claims/  

A Russian Commentator Provides a More Accurate Picture of Trump than Does the Western Media

“The first 100 days of Donald Trump’s second presidency have sparked a wave of commentary portraying him as a revolutionary. Indeed, the speed, pressure, and determination with which he has acted are striking. But this view is superficial. Trump is not dismantling the foundations of the American state or society. On the contrary, he seeks to restore the pre-globalist republic that the liberal elite long ago diverted onto a utopian internationalist path. In this sense, Trump is not a revolutionary, but a counterrevolutionary – an ideological revisionist determined to reverse the excesses of the liberal era.

“At home, Trump benefits from Republican majorities in both houses of Congress. Legal challenges to his policies – particularly on downsizing government and deporting illegal immigrants – have so far made little progress. Accustomed to media attacks, Trump continues to hit back hard. The recent story alleging that top officials debated strikes on Yemen over Signal has not gained political traction. If anything, it reinforces Trump’s image as a president who acts decisively and without fear of scandal.

“Trump’s economic course is clear: re-industrialization, tariff protectionism, and investment in cutting-edge technologies. He is reversing decades of globalist integration, pressing allies to pool financial and technological resources with the US to rebuild its industrial base. Tactically, Trump applies pressure early, then offers retreats and compromises to lure competitors into negotiations favorable to America. This approach has been effective, particularly with Washington’s allies. Even with China, Trump is betting that Beijing’s reliance on the US market, and America’s influence over EU and Japanese trade policy, will yield strategic concessions.”

Dmitry Trenin’s assessment can be read here:  https://www.rt.com/news/616578-trumps-foreign-policy-calculated/ 

PCR comment:  Trenin, like so many Russians hopeful of being part of the West, overlooks the possibility that the purpose of the Ukrainian peace negotiations is to sequence the West’s wars against Russia and China.  I look forward to reading Dmitry Trenin’s assessment of West Mitchell’s recent article in Foreign Affairs.  https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2025/04/26/a-peace-deal-or-a-deception/ 

The US president has renamed two WWII and WWI-related holidays to “start celebrating our victories”

The US played the most significant role in achieving victories in the two world wars, President Donald Trump claimed on Friday. Trump made the claim while announcing he has designated May 8 as Victory Day for WWII and November 11 Victory Day for WWI.

Nazi Germany officially capitulated to the Allied forces on May 8, 1945, shortly after Soviet troops captured Berlin. The surrender took effect after midnight in Moscow. Traditionally, May 8 is observed as Victory in Europe Day, with Russia celebrating on May 9.

”Many of our allies and friends are celebrating May 8th as Victory Day, but we did more than any other Country, by far, in producing a victorious result on World War II,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social on Thursday.

“Nobody was close” to the US “in terms of strength, bravery, or military brilliance,” Trump claimed. “We won both Wars,” he wrote, adding that “We are going to start celebrating our victories again!”

Trump’s praise for the US military effort in Europe comes as he pressures fellow NATO member states to ratchet up their defense budgets. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has warned that the EU must take responsibility for its own defense as the US is gradually stepping back from its security commitments on the continent.

The US president has previously claimed that Russia “helped” the US win WWII, drawing a rebuke from Moscow. Earlier this week, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov noted that while Russia is grateful to the US for its support during the Second World War via the Lend-Lease program, the Soviet Union would have beaten Nazi Germany anyway.

The US does not officially observe any public holidays dedicated specifically to World War II. However, remembrance ceremonies have been held nationwide in May, August, and September for many years. On November 11, the US celebrates Veterans Day, commemorating the 1918 armistice , which suspended active hostilities and effectively ended the World War I.