Tag: crime

Commentary: The Undercounted Statistics of Illegal Immigrants

RealClearWire

In June, Victor Martinez-Hernandez was charged with the murder of Rachel Morin, a mother of five in Maryland. Police in Oklahoma tracked the accused repeat offender down with a sample of his DNA recovered from a Los Angeles home invasion in which a nine-year-old girl and her mother were assaulted. Police say he came to the U.S. illegally to escape prosecution for at least one other murder in his native El Salvador in December 2022. 

“That should never have been allowed to happen,” said Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler, referring to the numerous missed red flags the case presented. His office apprehended Hernandez in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

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Analysis: Crime Overall Is Not as Low as Biden-Harris Say, and Murder Rates Are Troubling

James Agresti

Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, media outlets, and so-called “fact checkers” are claiming that “violent crime is near a 50-year low.” In contrast, Donald Trump is alleging that “crime is worse than it’s ever been.” The reality is that all of them are wrong. There are three key measures of violent crime with various strengths…

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Commentary: Media Push Misleading Crime Stats to Protect Democrat Narrative

RealClearWire
Crime Scene

Crime is a major issue in this year’s election, yet major media ignored the release of a significant new government report showing a surge in violent crime. The increase in violent crime during the Biden administration is a record increase.

The latest data released last Thursday from the Department of Justice’s National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) reveal a sharp increase in violent crime under the Biden-Harris administration compared to when Trump left office.

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Shoplifting and Vehicle Thefts Soared as Haitian Migrants Poured into Ohio Town, Police Data Shows

Daily Caller News Foundation

Reports of shoplifting and vehicle theft increased considerably in Springfield, Ohio, following the arrival of thousands of Haitian refugees, according to data obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation through a records request. The town, which had a population of 58,622 in 2020, has taken in between 12,000 and 20,000 Haitian refugees over the past three years, marking a population increase of between 20.4% and 34.1%. From 2021 to 2023, Springfield also saw a 51.5% jump in motor vehicle theft reports and a 112.8% spike in reports of shoplifting, data provided by the Springfield Police Division shows.

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Rule of Lawfare: Jury Instructions from NY Judge to Manhattan Jurors in Trump ‘Hush Money’ Case Contained Made-up and Selectively Chosen Language

Rachel Alexander

A New York jury found former President Donald Trump guilty on all 34 criminal counts related to falsifying business records last week, prompting outcry that New York Judge Juan Merchan, who was handpicked to handle the case and who donated to Joe Biden, committed misconduct during the trial, including how he handled the jury instructions. A CNN senior legal analyst reported that the case was full of so many legal stretches that employees of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office referred to it as the “zombie case.” Daniel Street, an attorney in Louisiana who writes about lawfare, told The Tennessee Star the jury instructions were “terrible.”

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House Republicans Forcing Tough and Defining Votes on Democrats Ahead of November Election

Just the News
Committee on House Administration chairman Bryan Steil

Ahead of the November election, Republicans have forced tough votes on Democrats that may hurt their chances at the polls. From election security to law enforcement to illegal immigration, House Republicans have passed bills that most House Democrats have voted against, despite Americans’ prevalent concerns about those issues.

According to the Center Square Voters’ Voice Poll, conducted with Noble Predictive Insights in March, when given a range of top concerns, 45 percent of likely voters said inflation/price increases, 44 percent said illegal immigration, and 24 percent said the economy/jobs.

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Poll Finds Biden Hemorrhaging Support Among Crucial Voting Block — Even as They Trend Democrat on Key Issues

Minnesota Sun Staff
President Joe Biden

President Joe Biden is losing support among Latinos ahead of the 2024 election despite the crucial voting block moving toward the Democratic Party on key issues, a Tuesday poll found.

Support for Biden among Latino Americans has steadily declined since the last time the question was asked in June 2023, and he now holds only a nine-point favorability lead over former President Donald Trump, according to an Axios/Ipsos survey. The poll also found that Latinos are backing Democrats on the issues of abortion and immigration, and are trending toward the party on the economy and crime.

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Conservatives Hope Supreme Court’s Initial Ruling on Texas Immigration Law Inspires Other States

Just the News

A preliminary Supreme Court ruling that allowed Texas to begin enforcing a state law empowering local police to arrest and deport illegal aliens if the federal government doesn’t should inspire other states to follow suit, prominent conservatives tell Just the News.

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Trump Pays Tribute to Laken Riley, Blasts Biden Border Policies as ‘Crime Against Humanity’

Just the News

Donald Trump met with Laken Riley’s family and unleashed a blistering attack Saturday on President Joe Biden’s border policies as a “crime against humanity” as the two likely general candidates staged dueling events in the battleground state of Georgia. “Joe Biden has no remorse, no regret, no empathy, no compassion, and worst of all, he has no intention of stopping the deadly invasion that stole precious Laken’s beautiful American life,” Trump told a rally in Rome, Ga., the home district of close ally Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

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Couple Flees Minneapolis as Crime Turns Neighborhood They Once Loved into ‘Third-World Country’

Minnesota Sun Staff
Minneapolis Residents

It’s not often a mid-morning interview starts with such a stern warning.

“Didn’t you tell her to be careful?” Jon Loidolt asked.

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Rampant Crime Takes Toll on America’s Small Businesses, New Survey Reveals

Minnesota Sun Staff
Small Business

Nearly one-third of small business employers in January said that crime has raised everyday business costs, according to a Job Creators Network Foundation (JCNF) poll obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Around 31% of small businesses surveyed in January said that neighborhood crime has increased business costs through added expenses associated with extra security or stolen inventory, with employers in the western U.S. being the most likely to say they were affected at 35%, according to the poll. Businesses with $100,000 to $250,000 in revenue in a year were the most likely to say that neighborhood crime has increased business costs, with 53% saying yes, followed by businesses with less than $100,000 in revenue at 47%.

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Poll Finds Americans Worried About National Debt

The Center Square
Congress Spending

Americans are worried about the national debt, according to the results of a new poll.

Americans have the national debt crisis as one of their top concerns along with war, inflation and crime. Those polled think the overspending has a direct impact on their personal security and also has an impact on the security of the United States, according to a recent study commissioned by Main Street Economics, a nonprofit group designed to educate Americans on the nation’s debt crisis.

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Commentary: President Trump’s Plan to Save America’s Cities

RealClearWire
Trump NYC

With all the devastating news about urban crime, drug overdoses, illegal immigration, rampant homelessness, out-of-control budgets, and educational failures, it is encouraging that President Donald Trump has committed his next administration to a saving America’s cities.

As Just the News reported, “With the nation’s first primary state as a backdrop, former President Donald Trump took aim Saturday at Democrats’ urban strongholds, vowing to both secure and revitalize blue cities weary from years of violence and economic decay.”

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Starbucks Shutters Seven Stores in Crime-Ridden Parts of San Francisco

Minnesota Sun Staff

Starbucks plans to close seven stores located in downtown San Francisco in October, a spokesperson for the company confirmed.

The corporation looked into “several factors” when it decided to close the seven locations, and added that it would continue to invest in San Francisco through its 40 other company-owned locations in the city, a Starbucks spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation. Although the company declined to comment on whether crime was a factor that led to its decision, all seven of the closing locations — Mission & Main, Geary & Taylor, 425 Battery, 398 Market St, 4th & Market, 555 California and Bush & Van Ness — are situated in or near the city’s troubledTenderloin district, a Starbucks store map showed.

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Washington D.C. Ranked as Least Desirable Place to Live

Minnesota Sun Staff

A new survey has declared that the nation’s capital of Washington D.C. is the least desirable place to live, primarily due to high costs of living and rampant crime.

As reported by Breitbart, the survey published by Home Bay, which specializes in real estate education, asked residents to determine the most and least desirable places to live based on such factors as costs of living, home affordability, and crime rates.

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Workers at Nancy Pelosi Federal Building in San Francisco Told to Work from Home Due to Crime

Just the News

The Department of Health and Human Services is telling hundreds of California-based employees to work from home for the foreseeable future due to rising crime in the area surrounding the Nancy Pelosi Federal Building in San Francisco.

The 18-story building also houses the Labor and Transportation separtment and the office of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

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Commentary: What a Difference a Real District Attorney Makes

Admin

Chesa Boudin, named after cop-killer Joanne Chesimard, and son of Weather Underground terrorists Kathy Boudin and David Gilbert, was elected district attorney of San Francisco in November 2020. Criminals were happy with the outcome.

“Chesa Boudin threw a monkey wrench into the city’s criminal justice system,” recalls Richie Greenberg, San Francisco resident and business consultant. “Amid a series of high-profile cases, his promise to release repeat criminals and to allow quality of life crimes to go unpunished, San Francisco descended into a scofflaw paradise.”

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Minneapolis Star Tribune CEO Apologizes for ‘Pain’ Caused by Cartoon Poking Fun at Muslim Call to Prayer

Admin

Star Tribune CEO and publisher Steve Grove has apologized for the “pain” caused by a cartoon that made some readers feel “targeted and mischaracterized.”

Mike Thompson’s debut cartoon for the paper featured a man telling his wife: “Broadcasting the Muslim call to prayer at all hours will make Minneapolis too noisy.”

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Republicans, Democrats Holding Their 2024 Party Conventions in Two of the Most Dangerous Cities in America

M.D. Kittle

The biggest parties in U.S. politics will be held in two of the more dangerous cities in America. 

A former conservative sheriff who has been an equal-opportunity critic of Democrats and Republicans wants to know what convention organizers are thinking. 

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Ramsey County Sheriff Slams Commissioners for ‘Utterly Ignoring Crime’

Admin

A war of words between the Ramsey County Board of Commissioners and Sheriff Bob Fletcher boiled over Friday as the board accused the sheriff of an “act of racism.”

The dispute began Tuesday when the board voted to increase oversight of Fletcher’s spending, which the sheriff welcomed.

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Minnesota House Democrats Pass Voting Rights for Felons Currently in Prison

Admin

Minnesota Democrats want to join just a handful of states where felons never lose their right to vote.

This was revealed during a House floor debate Thursday night, which saw the passage of State Rep. Cedrick Frazier’s, DFL-New Hope, bill to restore voting rights to felons once they are released from incarceration. Under current law, felons are not allowed to vote until they complete their entire sentence, including probation and parole.

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After Seattle Defunded Its Police, Local Business Owners Say Crime Is Worse than Ever

Admin

Two years after Seattle slashed its police budget, local business owners say crime has skyrocketed, with police unable to deal with thefts, homelessness and open-air drug use that plague the city. Seattle and broader King County had more than 13,000 homeless people within its boundaries in 2022, more than every other similar area except Los Angeles County and New York City, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, while the Seattle Police Department (SPD) lost more than 130 officers, KOMO News reported, as homicides, shootings and motor vehicle thefts increased. Local business owners say law enforcement is failing to effectively deter the rampant drug use and theft disturbing their livelihoods.

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Commentary: Europe Shows a Clear Link Between Immigration and Crime

RealClearWire

Violent crime is becoming common in Sweden, shocking residents of the famously placid Scandinavian nation, where horrific acts of violence have become “all too familiar,” according to Common Sense Media, part of a Swedish nonprofit organization.   

Since 2018, Swedish authorities have recorded an estimated 500 bombings, while what they describe as gang shootings have become increasingly common. The country reported a record 124 homicides in 2020 and many residents were shocked in April when violent riots injured more than 100 police officers.  

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Democrat Mayor Wants to Give Herself a Pay Raise Despite City’s Rampant Crime

Minnesota Sun Staff

Democratic Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot is lobbying for a raise to her $216,000 salary, according to the Chicago Sun Times, despite the city’s crime problem worsening considerably under her leadership.

The Mayor’s salary hasn’t changed since 2005, but Lightfoot’s new budget proposal includes an annual salary adjustment equivalent to the rate of inflation, capping it at 5%, according to the Chicago Sun Times. Chicago has seen major crime spikes in several categories, including homicide, under Lightfoot’s leadership.

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Conservative Organization Unveils Ad Campaign Targeting ‘Hyper-Deadly Consequence’ of Democrats’ Crime Policies

Admin

Citizens for Sanity, a conservative organization, is targeting the effects of “far-left policies” on rising crime rates in a new six-figure nationwide ad campaign.

The ad from Citizens for Sanity, first obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation, is set to circulate on Facebook and YouTube after Labor Day and is targeted toward Latino voters. It criticizes “woke progressive prosecutors” releasing “dangerous predators before trial” and features footage of criminal violence.

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Hispanic Americans Point to Crime, Immigration and the Economy as Key Concerns

ADN America

Recent reports indicate a dramatic political shift for Hispanic Americans, citing a defection from the left toward the right. While some mainstream media accounts dispute the shift, other national surveys are missing the on-the-ground factors that illustrate why a sizeable portion of Latinos are moving right politically, and the fact that many polls suggest Hispanics are drifting from the Democratic party over economic issues.

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U.S. Attorney: Crime Epidemic ‘Far More Disturbing’ Than Numbers Show

Minnesota Sun Staff

U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota Andrew Luger headed a press conference on Friday to give updates on a joint violent crime strategy which has been in place in Minnesota and the Twin Cities since spring.

Luger said several arrests have recently been made of high-risk violent offenders, including a sweep that took place on Thursday in Minneapolis and St. Paul that netted five offenders and involved a specialized team of ATF agents.

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Article Shows Ellison Bashing Capitalism, Describing Fear of Crime as ‘White Hysteria’

Admin

In a brief Star Tribune commentary from nearly three decades ago, current Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison trashed capitalism for its “exploitation of labor” and accused the paper of contributing to “white hysteria.”

Alpha News obtained a photocopy of the Star Tribune edition printed on Saturday, Aug. 7, 1993. In the “counterpoint” section of commentary, the paper published a brief article by Ellison, a then-litigator who was identified as a participant in that year’s urban peace summit in St. Paul from July 14-18. One of the summit’s speakers appears to have been notorious anti-white racist and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan.

Ellison’s piece responded to what he perceive

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Minneapolis Residents Resort to Crowdfunding to Pay for Neighborhood Policing

Admin

Residents in Minneapolis are crowdfunding to get off-duty police officers to patrol the streets as the city continues to experience staffing shortages and an uptick in violent crime.

The Minneapolis Safety Initiative (MSI), a nonprofit seeking to increase law and order, is raising money to “buyback officer patrols.” Funds that are raised through the volunteer-led initiative will be sent to the Minneapolis Police Department to get officers deployed for shifts that the officers would otherwise not be working, MSI says.

“Officers working a buyback shift patrol in MPD vehicles, respond to 911 calls, and deter criminals—just as they do in a normal shift,” according to MSI. “All people working on this initiative are volunteers. There are fees for payment processing but otherwise, all contributions will go directly to paying for MPD buyback officer patrols.”

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Brooklyn Center Police Chief Says Minneapolis Suburb Needs Help Fighting Crime

Minnesota Sun Staff

Brooklyn Center’s new police chief has taken stock of the crime situation and determined the city “really” needs help.

Chief Kellace McDaniel spoke at a Brooklyn Center City Council meeting last Monday evening after Commander Tony Gruenig presented various statistics on the city’s crime and police staffing levels, CCX Media reported. McDaniel was appointed to his new role three weeks ago after previously serving as a lieutenant in the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office.

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Commentary: Keys to GOP’s Hispanic Outreach in Pennsylvania and Nationwide

RealClearWire

After this month’s historic special election win in South Texas, Republican strategists nationwide are asking themselves: how can we replicate now-Congresswoman Mayra Flores’s success in flipping an 84% Hispanic district to the GOP? Meantime, Democrats are burying their heads in the South Texas sand as Hispanic voters flee their party.

It’s not rocket science to appeal to Hispanic voters and persuade them to vote Republican. My firm’s work with the Hispanic Republican Coalition of Pennsylvania shows how to do it.

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Commentary: The Criminal Order Beneath the ‘Chaos’ of San Francisco’s Tenderloin

RealClearWire

The epicenter of the political earthquakes rattling San Francisco’s progressive establishment is a 30-square-block neighborhood in the center of downtown known as the Tenderloin. Adjacent to some of the city’s most famous attractions, including the high-end shopping district Union Square, the old money redoubt of Nob Hill, historic Chinatown, and the city’s gold-capped City Hall, it is home to a giant, open-air drug bazaar. Tents fill the sidewalks. Addicts sit on curbs and lean against walls, nodding off to their fentanyl and heroin fixes, or wander around in meth-induced psychotic states. Drug dealers stake out their turf and sell in broad daylight, while the immigrant families in the five-story, pre-war apartment buildings shepherd their kids to school, trying to maintain as normal an existence as they can.

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Numbers of Black Americans Murdered Increased in Wake of Defund the Police Movement: Report

Admin

Support for calls across the nation to to defund police departments nationwide and pandemic-related factors has led to an increase in the number of murders of black Americans, according to an analysis by the Manhattan Institute.

The overall murder rate increased 30% from 2020 to 2021, according to data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

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Felony Suspect Bailed Out by Minnesota Freedom Fund Charged with Auto Theft Three Days Later

Admin
Ismail Hussein

The Minnesota Freedom Fund supplied bail for a suspect who had been in custody on a felony charge after being arrested in a stolen vehicle in Bloomington. Three days after being bailed out by the organization, the man stole a vehicle in Minneapolis and crashed it into a building while trying to flee, charges say.

The controversial nonprofit bail fund, MFF, which raised over $40 million in celebrity-fueled donations during and after the George Floyd riots in 2020, has come under fire several times since then. The organization raised millions on the premise that it would bail out any peaceful protesters arrested at the time. But instead, the organization has repeatedly bailed out offenders with violent or lengthy criminal histories, some of whom have subsequently been charged with new crimes while out on bail, including murder, sex crimes and serious assaults.

One recent repeat offender bailed out by MFF is Ismail Mohamed Hussein, 23, of Minneapolis. In addition to having ten prior convictions since 2019, including felony charges of theft and first-degree burglary of an occupied dwelling, Hussein was arrested at least four times in just 23 days in January of this year.

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Commentary: Soros Mindset Invades Nashville

Admin
Sarah Beth Myers and George Soros

Obviously, a multitude of factors are at play, but if you had to pick one man most responsible for the massive increase in crime of all sorts in American cities over the past few years, from pervasive looting to assault (sexual or otherwise) to murder, it would be billionaire investor George Soros.

Through his Open Society Foundations—described as “the world’s largest private funder of independent groups working for justice, democratic governance, and human rights”—plus various other entities, sub-entities, and cutouts, Soros has financed the political campaigns of numerous district attorneys and attorneys general across the country.

All of them were leftists, working from a principle of minimal, if any, incarceration or bail in any but the most extreme situations—and often in what most of would assume was extreme. The perpetrator, most probably, they assume, is the product of a miserable childhood, and therefore worthy of more sympathy than the victim. That many who had equally miserable childhoods still are able to function as law-abiding adults is evidently of little consequence to these DAs and AGs.

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New Poll Is Bad News for a Californian Left-Wing DA Facing Recall

Admin

A new poll showed San Francisco voters overwhelmingly back the recall of District Attorney Chesa Boudin.

Roughly 68% of likely primary voters said they would vote to recall Boudin, including 64% of registered Democrats, according to a poll conducted by EMC Research. Nearly three out of four voters had an unfavorable opinion of Boudin, and 61% agreed he was “responsible for rising crime rates in San Francisco, especially burglaries and thefts.”

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Minnesota Republicans Release Plan to Address Public Safety

Cooper Moran

Republicans in the Minnesota House of Representatives on Tuesday released their plan to address public safety, unveiling almost a dozen different pieces of legislation.

The lawmakers argued that members of the opposing political party have not addressed the spike in crime that has been felt by residents of the state.

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Academia’s Woke Influence on the Media: Analysis

Admin

Higher education’s push for Critical Race Theory influences not just college campuses, but also American society and media.

Earlier this year, Campus Reform reported on a Jan. 20 speaking event at the University of Pittsburgh where three scholars used the Critical Race Theory framework to examine three controversial court cases decided in Nov. 2021.

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Blue States Consider Letting Anatomical Males into Women’s Prisons, Hiding Their Backgrounds

Minnesota Sun Staff
barbed wire fence, outiside of a prison yard

As West Coast states deal with the fallout of putting anatomically male inmates in women’s prisons, the East Coast is looking to join the club.

Maryland is considering legislation similar to a California law that lets inmates choose their correctional facility based on self-declared gender identity, an option that concerned even transgender inmates in the Golden State.

A purported draft executive order by President Joe Biden would do the same to federal prisons, prompting GOP Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas to introduce opposing legislation.

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Antifa Vandalizes Businesses, Blocks Traffic During Lake Street March

Minnesota Sun Staff
red spray paint on the outer glass of a business

Far-left Antifa radicals vandalized businesses and blocked traffic with barricades during a two-hour march down Lake Street in Minneapolis Friday night.

The march was infiltrated by independent photojournalist Rebecca Brannon, who said that Antifa-affiliated accounts had been posting about the “direct action” all week.

Brannon reports that a helicopter was circling overhead the entire time, but no police ever showed up during the two-hour occupation.

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Report: 12 Percent of Law Enforcement Officers Were Assaulted While on Duty in 2020

The Center Square
people protesting in front of law enforcment

Nearly 12% of police officers were assaulted while on duty in 2020, according to annual state level data collected by the FBI. Alaska reported the greatest percentage, California the greatest number.

A total of 60,105 officers were assaulted nationwide, with the overwhelming majority assaulted, and injured, by assailants’ hands and feet.

Nationwide, 26% of assaults in 2020 involved a deadly weapon that wasn’t a firearm; 5% involved a firearm.

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Minnesota Lawmakers Kick Off 2022 Session with $7B, Priorities

The Center Square

The Minnesota Legislature kicked off its first day of the 2022 session with plans to crack down on violent crime and spend down $7.7 billion of taxpayer surplus.

Senate Republicans are targeting tax cuts, reducing crime, and empowering parents in education, Senate Majority Leader Jeremy Miller, R-Winona, said in a press conference last week.

“We are hearing from folks across the state and people are concerned. Crime is up, kids are falling behind, and record inflation is eating away at family budgets. Things are moving in the wrong direction and Senate Republicans are focused on solutions to get Minnesota back on the Right Track,” Miller, said in a statement. “We will fund more police officers and hold criminals accountable to reduce crime. We’ll empower parents to be partners in their kids’ education so they can catch up and meet expectations after nearly two years of disrupted learning. We will provide permanent, ongoing tax relief so people have more money in their pockets after every paycheck.”

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16 Republican AGs Seek Federal Pressure on China, Mexico over Fentanyl Crisis

The Center Square
Antony Blinken

Sixteen Republican state attorneys general are calling on Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken to take action against China and Mexico for their role in creating a fentanyl crisis in the U.S.

“China’s complete unwillingness to police the production and distribution of fentanyl precursors and Mexico’s subsequent failure to control illegal manufacturing of fentanyl using those precursors,” the attorneys general argue, poses a daily threat to Americans.

West Virginia and Arizona are leading the effort. Joining them are the attorneys general of Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas. They say they’ve witnessed an “extraordinary tide of senseless death from fentanyl” in their states.

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After Defund the Police Changes Local Sex Offender Policies, Students Feel ‘Compromised’

Minnesota Sun Staff

With cops in Austin, Texas, not supervising “hundreds of sex offender cases” due to Defund the Police budget cuts, Campus Reform spoke with students at the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin) about their safety.

“The situation in the city of Austin has been critical for some time ever since the city of Austin council decided to defund the police unanimously in the summer of 2020, and reduce their police budget by one-third,” sophomore Carter Moxley said.

Moxley also discussed UT Austin President Jay Hartzell’s decision last November to “increase [University of Texas Police Department] patrol in the west campus area and develop additional options to enhance safety for [the] students” after a violent incident near campus.

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Commentary: More Trouble for the FBI in the Whitmer Kidnapping Case

Minnesota Sun Staff
Gretchen Whitmer

The media went wild last week after Joe Biden’s Justice Department finally produced a criminal indictment to support the claim that January 6 was an “insurrection” planned by militiamen loyal to Donald Trump: Eleven members of the Oath Keepers, including its founder, Stewart Rhodes, face the rarely used charge of seditious conspiracy for their brief and nonviolent involvement at the Capitol protest that day.

Journalists luxuriated in the news, jeering those of us who had correctly noted that the Justice Department had failed to charge anyone with insurrection or sedition for more than a year.

But the press does not share the same zeal in covering another politically charged investigation: the imploding criminal case against five men accused of plotting to kidnap Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer in 2020. The kidnapping narrative shares many similarities with their preferred telling of January 6, not the least of which is that alleged militias incited by Trump attempted to carry out a domestic terror attack.

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Commentary: We Are All ‘Domestic Terrorists’ Now

Minnesota Sun Staff

Paul Hodgkins, according to Joe Biden’s Justice Department, is a domestic terrorist.

A working-class man from Tampa, Hodgkins committed what Democrats and the media consider a murderous crime comparable to flying a packed jetliner into a skyscraper or detonating a truck filled with explosives under a crowded federal building.

Paul Hodgkins entered the Capitol building on January 6, 2021.

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Commentary: Police Officer Who Killed Ashli Babbitt was Cleared of Criminal Wrongdoing Without Interview

RealClearWire

When U.S. Capitol Police Lt. Michael Byrd went on “NBC Nightly News” to tell his side of shooting and killing unarmed Jan. 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt, he made a point to note he’d been investigated by several agencies and exonerated for his actions that day.

“There’s an investigative process [and] I was cleared by the DOJ [Department of Justice], and FBI and [the D.C.] Metropolitan Police,” he told NBC News anchor Lester Holt in August, adding that the Capitol Police also cleared him of wrongdoing and decided not to discipline or demote him for the shooting.

Byrd then answered a series of questions by Holt about the shooting, but what he told the friendly journalist, he likely never told investigators. That’s because he refused to answer their questions, according to several sources and documents reviewed by RealClearInvestigations.

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Just a Third of Americans View COVID-19 as a Top-Five Priority, Poll Shows

Minnesota Sun Staff

Less than 40% of Americans view the coronavirus as a top-five issue to address in 2022, a new poll shows.

The Associated Press-NORC survey found that just 33% of Americans labeled virus concerns as a top issue, down 16 points from a year ago. On the other hand, 68% of respondents said that the economy was the top issue on which to focus this year, with subtopics ranging from inflation to unemployment and the national debt.

The results come as inflation has hit a multi-decade high and supply chain bottlenecks continue to affect Americans’ lives. However, it also comes as the Omicron coronavirus variant has fueled daily case counts near record-highs, with the U.S. now averaging over 650,000 new infections per day.

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Former Sheriff Slams Walz for ‘Apathetic’ Response to Record Homicides

Minnesota Sun Staff
Former Sheriff Richard Stanek and Gov. Tom Wolf

In 1995, Minneapolis saw a record-setting 97 homicides. Operating by the strict definition of a homicide as an event where one person intentionally kills another, there were 97 homicides in the city last year.

The final homicide of 2021 occurred just hours before the new year as a 15-year-old boy was gunned down in north Minneapolis. No arrests have been made. The shooters are believed to have fired from a vehicle.

Some homicides, like the killing of Winston Smith in June, were justified and non-criminal. Technicalities aside, most share a concern about the high number of murders in 2021.

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