Author: The Daily Signal

Last August, as Americans watched the fallout from a police shooting in Kenosha, Wis., pastor James E. Ward Jr. found himself in a position to help. The victim, Jacob Blake, had been shot seven times in the back. Violence erupted in Kenosha. Ward, pastor and founder of INSIGHT Church in the north Chicago suburb of Skokie, Ill., turned to prayer.

“I get this phone call on my cellphone from Julia Jackson,” Ward tells The Daily Signal. “Julia Jackson is one of our faithful intercessory-prayer team members in our church. Julia happens to be the mother of Jacob Blake Jr. … And we prayed that Jacob would live and not die. And we’re thankful that he’s alive today, and he’s doing well.”

The shooting left Blake paralyzed below the waist. Yet both Jackson, Blake’s mother, and Ward, her pastor, decided “to speak a different narrative. We weren’t calling for a hatred. We weren’t calling for destruction. We’re calling for peace and speaking the love of God over the city. And it really went viral.”

Ward rejects “victim mentality” and ideologies like critical race theory. He purposefully took a different approach from Black Lives Matter and found himself working with President Donald Trump last year. Now, he’s preaching this “new attitude” in a book called “Zero Victim.”

Ward visited The Daily Signal to discuss “Zero Victim: Overcoming Injustice With a New Attitude” and his experience in Kenosha last year. 

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When law enforcement cleared protesters from Lafayette Square last year, left-leaning media outlets immediately ran with the narrative that President Donald Trump had ordered the move so he could get a photo-op in front of nearby St. John’s Church.

But a new inspector general’s report reveals the truth: Trump had nothing to do with the police action.

Tim Murtaugh, who was communications director for Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign, views this episode—as well as numerous other Trump-related stories that the media has had to retract—as one of the dangers of what he calls “pack journalism.”

“No single reporter wants to be the only one going out and saying, ‘Hey, maybe this isn’t what everybody thinks it is,'” Murtaugh says. “So everybody stays in the same pack, they all report it the same way. And what do you know, almost every single time you’ve got all the media on one side, Donald Trump on the other side, and very often, those things fall apart.”

Murtaugh joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss media malfeasance in reporting on Trump, why so-called mainstream outlets run cover for the radical left, and what conservatives can do to make sure they can find honest and high-quality news.

We also cover these stories:

• The Supreme Court rules 9-9 that Catholic Social Services may keep putting children into foster homes in accord with its religious belief that marriage is the union of one man and one woman.
• In another decision, the high court votes 7-2 to uphold the Affordable Care Act, popularly known as Obamacare.
• The federal government will observe Juneteenth on Friday, as the observance becomes a national holiday celebrating the end of slavery in America.

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Public education in New York City is far from what it once was, Ian Rowe, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, says. 

“I had a great public school education in New York City kindergarten through 12th grade,” Rowe says.

But today, he says, New York City's public schools aren't meeting the needs of students. He notes that in the South Bronx, for example, “only 2%" of students who started ninth grade in 2015 graduated from high school "ready for college."

Different factors contributed to this decline, but with students struggling to read and do basic math, Rowe says, ideologies such as critical race theory serve only as a “distraction.” 

In 2022, Rowe says, he plans to launch Vertex Partnership Academies in the Bronx, a network of charter-based international baccalaureate high schools. 

Rowe joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss why he promotes school choice options in New York and to explain why critical race theory doesn't benefit students.

We also cover these stories:

• President Biden meets the press in Geneva after meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
• Putin dodges reporters' questions about his human rights record and Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. 
• Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says she is concerned by the leak of private taxpayer information to the media outlet ProPublica.

Enjoy the show!

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Kevin McGary is the president of Every Black Life Matters, with emphasis on the "Every."

McGary joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to discuss the contrasts between the Black Lives Matters organization and his own group, how fatherlessness has adversely affected the black community, critical race theory, the racist origins of Margaret Sanger and Planned Parenthood, and more.

"When we encounter people who are diehard BLMers, they usually say, 'Hey, ... black lives matter,'" McGary said.

"And I go up to them, and I get in their face, and I say, 'You know what, to me, bro, every single black life matters.' And then I asked them, 'Now, does every single black life matter to you?' And then they're stuck. They're like, 'Ooh, this brother, he's coming with something.'"

We also cover these stories:

• The House Oversight and Reform Committee releases emails revealing that the Trump White House put pressure on then-Deputy Attorney General Jeff Rosen to investigate voter fraud claims.
• Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., defends the Trump administration's Justice Department for subpoenaing the phone and email records of House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff and Rep. Eric Swalwell, both California Democrats. 
• Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., apologizes for comparing the House speaker's requirement that members of Congress continue to wear a face mask against COVID-19 on the House floor with Jews being made to wear gold stars by the Nazis during the Holocaust. 

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 Brenda Tillett is the founder and president of Stand Up Virginia.

She joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to talk about the new organization and how it’s working to hold rogue prosecutors accountable.

"In Fairfax County, Steve Descano was funded by George Soros," Tillett says. Descano is the elected Fairfax County, Va., commonwealth's attorney. Soros is a leftist billionaire who funds a wide variety of left-wing candidates and causes.

And there are four other rogue commonwealth's attorneys in Virginia who were also funded by George Soros. What they do is, they go in, and they completely dismantle law enforcement.And what do I mean by that? Well, for instance, Steve Descano has a policy that if you're a juvenile, meaning 17 years old, you will not have a public record. You won't have a criminal record.So if you want to get together with your friends who are gang members and beat up a 30-year-old man who's leaving a convenience store, bash his teeth in, leave him bleeding to die, Steve Descano will either bring that down to a misdemeanor or not prosecute you.

Tillett joins the podcast to discuss all of that and more.

Jeff Hunt, the director of the Lakewood, Colorado-based Centennial Institute, also joins "The Daily Signal Podcast." Hunt's organization this week is hosting the Western Conservative Summit, which includes "live speakers as well as mini-documentaries showcasing Western leaders, Western issues, and the beauty and majesty of the Western United States."

We also cover these stories:

• President Joe Biden arrives at NATO headquarters in Brussels on Monday and reaffirms America's commitment to the North Atlantic alliance. 
• Before his meeting with Biden, Russian President Vladimir Putin tells NBC that he isn’t able to give his word as to whether or not Alexei Navalny, an opposition leader and critic of Putin, will leave prison alive.
• Republicans introduce a resolution to censure Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., and the other three members of "the Squad" for comments made last week likening the U.S. and Israel to Hamas and the Taliban. 

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Henry Ford, John D. Rockefeller, and Andrew Mellon flourished because of America's free-enterprise system. Yet, the foundations that bear their names are today pursuing a much different agenda, warns Rick Graber, president and CEO of the Bradley Foundation and chairman of the Philanthropy Roundtable.

"These foundations exist with their massive endowments because of these gentlemen that believed in free markets, took risks, and created just some incredible, incredible companies," Graber says. "It's hard to make the case that any of these foundations—Ford, Rockefeller, Mellon—are honoring donor intent. The founders would not be pleased."

Graber recently wrote about the topic for The Daily Signal, "Woke Foundations Use Dollars Acquired Through Capitalism to Undermine Free Market Principles," warning about the implications for America's future. He joined me on "The Daily Signal Podcast." 

Also on today's show, we also read your letters to the editor and share a good news story about a Waffle House manager who went out of his way to make sure one of his youngest employees could attend his high school graduation.

Enjoy the show!

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Dave Rubin, the host of "The Rubin Report" on YouTube and BlazeTV, was a liberal for many years before he realized the political left no longer represented him or his political views. 

“For me to tell you that I'm not a conservative at this point doesn't really make sense,” Rubin said. “It was a long ... journey to get there, but I don't mind saying it now.”

Rubin began to question the political left when he saw that the same people who preached tolerance were not willing to accept those who did not embrace the radical ideologies the left was promoting.

Rubin, who is also the author of "Don't Burn This Book: Thinking for Yourself in an Age of Unreason," joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to discuss how wokeness infiltrated progressivism and why he chose to walk away from the left. 

We also cover these stories: 

• President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson meet to confer on a new Atlantic Charter, which details eight different areas of collaboration between the U.S. and U.K.
• Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., is seeking to join the Congressional Black Caucus, but Democrats are reportedly blocking his membership.
• House Democrats call out Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., for saying the U.S. and Israel are similar to Hamas and the Taliban. 

Enjoy the show!

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Arguably no philosopher had a greater influence on America's founding than John Locke, says Joseph Loconte, director of the Center for American Studies at The Heritage Foundation. 

Locke’s ideas about property and freedom helped to shape America as the Founders drew on his ideas when they wrote the nation's founding documents. 

“[T]here was no philosopher who was quoted more often than John Locke by the American revolutionaries,” Loconte told “The Daily Signal Podcast.” 

An expert on Locke, Loconte is presenting a paper this week on the English philosopher and the biblical roots of American democracy at the virtual John Locke Conference in Naples, Italy. 

Loconte joins the show to discuss what advice Locke (1632-1704) would offer to America today and why the philosopher's writings remain so relevant to the American experiment.

We also discuss these stories:

• The Biden administration rescinds former President Donald Trump’s executive orders targeting the Chinese-owned apps TikTok and WeChat.
• Former President Barack Obama praises his daughters, Malia and Sasha, for their social activism.
• The New York Times comes under criticism after editorial board member Mara Gay tells MSNBC that seeing “dozens of American flags” on Long Island was “disturbing.” The newspaper insists she was "taken out of context."

Enjoy the show!

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Mark Meckler stepped in as Parler’s interim CEO after Amazon, Google, and Apple essentially canceled the social media platform. 

Meckler says he didn't intend to become CEO of Parler when he called the company in January to ask if he could help, but recognized the gravity of the situation and wanted to do all he could to defend free speech. 

“Parler was the point of the spear,” says Meckler, a former leader of Tea Party Patriots who is also president of Citizens for Self-Governance. “And if we allowed Big Tech and the Big Tech oligarchs to take Parler offline and leave it offline permanently, [these tech companies were drawing] a line in the sand that we might never be able to cross again.” 

Conservatives must be prepared to respond to opposition from Big Tech companies, he says, because “any conservative, whether you're a conservative business person or you're running a nonprofit organization,” is susceptible to what happened to Parler.

Meckler joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss his stint as Parler’s CEO and how the platform ultimately was restored. 

We also cover these stories:

• Vice President Kamala Harris defends the fact that she has not yet visited the southern border amid the ongoing border crisis. 
• A bipartisan group of senators announces release of the first congressional report detailing security failures that led to the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.
• Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and colleagues on the House Judiciary Committee ask Attorney General Merrick Garland to investigate an Antifa attack on journalist Andy Ngo.

Enjoy the show!

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Sen. Ted Cruz joins "The Daily Signal Podcast" to discuss his recent trip to Israel to observe the fighting that's been occurring in the region between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group. We discuss how Hamas has a headquarters in the basement of a hospital, effectively using innocent people as human shields.

"It's their own terrorists killing their own people, because they wanted to kill Israeli civilians, but they just weren't very good at it, and shot their own people instead," Cruz, R-Texas, told The Daily Signal.

"The press utterly ignores that," Cruz said. "The other civilians that are injured are predominantly the result of a decision that Hamas made to use Palestinians as human shields. So, they deliberately fire their weapons, fire their rockets from heavily populated civilian areas into heavily populated civilian areas.

"It's actually a double war crime. Shooting in a civilian area is a war crime, but shooting from civilian areas is also a war crime," the Texas Republican lawmaker said.

"The Hamas headquarters was in the basement of a hospital in Gaza," Cruz said, adding:

This is a Palestinian hospital. And here's the calculation Hamas is making: It's a win-win. Either the [Israeli Defense Forces] will refrain from attacking their headquarters, in which case, that's great. That's what they want. Or in the alternative, if the IDF does attack the headquarters, it will kill a significant number of Palestinians, and they're literally using Palestinian women and newborn babies.

We also cover these stories:

• The Supreme Court rules unanimously Monday that immigrants who came into the country illegally and were subsequently allowed to stay under temporary protected status can't get green cards or lawful permanent status.
• The Supreme Court declines to hear arguments in a case that could have required women to register for the military draft. As usual, the court did not specify why they chose to punt on the case, but did say they defer to Congress on the issue. 
• Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon, and his brother Mark will be traveling to space on the inaugural crewed flight of New Shepard, a rocket system created by Bezos’ aerospace company Blue Origin. 

“The Daily Signal Podcast” is available on Ricochet, Apple Podcasts, Pippa, Google Play, and Stitcher. All of our podcasts can be found at DailySignal.com/podcasts. If you like what you hear, please leave a review. You also can write to us at letters@dailysignal.com.

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