The lengths to which some Republicans went and continue to go to protect Donald Trump are mind-boggling. The sole purpose of Jim Jordan’s “weaponization” committee is to protect Donald Trump. Now, it has been revealed that both William Barr and his special counsel John Durham did the same thing.

As New York Times reported last week, Durham’s investigation did not find any wrongdoing in the origins of Mueller’s Russia investigation. Instead, they found wrongdoing by Donald Trump-and they covered it up. According to Raw Story, Durham found evidence of “suspicious financial deals” involving Donald Trump, which Italian officials reported. Instead of proceeding with a viable investigation against Donald Trump, Raw Story reported that Durham claimed that the “suspicious financial dealings” were on the part of the FBI.

Neither Barr nor Durham disclosed that their 2019 investigation continued because of the tip from Italian officials, and they never said one word about the trail leading to Donald Trump. Durham, of course, never filed any charges related to this discovery. Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor and constitutional expert, called the report “jaw dropping.” Tribe said: “When Durham unexpectedly found evidence of crimes committed BY rather than AGAINST Trump, he and Barr deliberately deceived the nation into thinking the opposite!” Sherrilyn Ifill, law professor and former President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund,” said: “Horrifying breaches of professional ethics, misuse of DOJ investigative resources, and deliberate lies to, and gaslighting of the public.” And Jim Jordan is worried about President Biden’s “weaponization” of the DOJ and FBI. He should have been as concerned when Trump was in office.

This shows, again, the hypocrisy of Republicans. House Republicans will sit on their hands as if none of this information is now public knowledge. In fact, former Associate White House Counsel Ian Bassin asked: “Surely, McCarthy and Jim Jordan’s new Select Committee on ‘the Weaponization of the Federal Government’ will focus on this story and the actions of Bill Barr, John Durham and Donald Trump. Surely, right? Right?” Yeah, don’t hold your breath. Republicans count on their voters ignoring such news and following their quest for blood of Democrats. The fact that they ignore this criminal activity and instead spend time and taxpayer dollars going after something that doesn’t exist tells you what they’re about, and no one in their right mind should continue voting for them. They have no concept of right or wrong other than as those terms fit their agenda. They will spend the next two years fighting to keep Democrats off committees and continuing to protect and cover up for Donald Trump. This is not how our government should operate, but unless and until people wise up and stop voting for Republican, this nonsense will continue.

Legal experts are calling for an ethics examination into John Durham Raw Story reported. Glenn Kirschner, former prosecutor, calls Durham’s investigation the true witch hunt. Bill Barr was behind this entire waste of time and money, but now that he has left government, he will be untouchable. Let Durham face the proverbial music alone, but someone needs to face it.

The post No surprise… appeared first on Palmer Report.

(NewsNation) — On Monday, President Joe Biden stood in front of the Baltimore and Potomac tunnel touting the latest project to come from the historic $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill he signed back in Nov. 2021.

“For years, people talked about fixing this tunnel,” Biden told a crowd in Baltimore. “This is a 150-year-old tunnel. You wonder how in the hell it’s still standing.”

Now, the tunnel is set to be replaced with funding from the bill. It’s just one of 6,900 specific projects that have been announced so far.

Here’s what’s happened since the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) was signed in 2021.

how will it be spent?

The vast majority of the bill’s funding (around 70%) is going toward transportation projects like rebuilding roads and bridges, expanding public transit options and modernizing the American rail system.

The second largest tranche of funding is earmarked for energy investments (11%) which will include building thousands of miles of new transmission lines.

An additional 7%, around $65 billion, will be used to expand broadband internet access, particularly in rural areas.

what’s been announced so far?

One year after Biden signed the bill, here are some of the results:

• $185 billion in total funding announced
• 6,900 specific projects have been funded across all 50 states and Washington, D.C.
• 2,800 bridge repair and replacement projects launched
• 5,000 new clean transit and school buses paid for with bill’s funds

which states have received the most funding?

It should come as no surprise that the most populous states in the country have received the bulk of the funding so far.

California has announced more than $16 billion in funding as of last Oct. 25, 2022. About 85% of that is going toward transportation projects. Texas and New York follow close behind, with $13.9 billion and $9.3 billion respectively.

You can see a full breakdown of each state’s funding here.

how does it compare to other infrastructure bills?

Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA)

• Year: 2021
• Total Cost: $1.2 trillion
• Percent of GDP: 5.1%

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA)

• Year: 2009
• Total cost: $840 billion
• Total cost in 2021 dollars: $1.1 trillion
• Percent of GDP: 5.7%

The New Deal

• Year: 1933
• Total cost: $41.7 billion
• Total cost in 2021 dollars: $901 billion
• Percent of GDP: 70%

U.S. President Joe Biden will deliver his first State of the Union address after Republicans took control of the House of Representatives in a speech that may mark the unofficial start of the 2024 presidential campaign season.

Here is what to expect.

Biden will deliver his 2nd State of the Union address on Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2023, at about 9 p.m. Eastern time (0200 GMT Wednesday). The speech will be broadcast live on the major U.S. broadcast television networks and online.

The speech could deliver Biden his largest television audience of the year. An estimated 38.2 million people watched the speech on U.S. television last year, according to the data provider Nielsen.

That audience will give Biden a chance to shape public perceptions over the debt limit, social spending, the Russian war in Ukraine and other topics as he plans to announce his re-election campaign in the coming weeks.

It also gives him an opportunity to shore up support among Democrats, some of whom are concerned about his age and other issues. Biden turned 80 in November and, if re-elected, would be 82 at the start of a second term.

He is expected to use the speech as an unofficial start to the 2024 presidential campaign season, laying out a set of policy priorities that may or may not find support in Congress.

He is expected to tout economic progress following the COVID-19 recession, draw sharp contrasts with the priorities of some Republican opponents and lay out “unity” agenda items that he believes should unite both parties.

The speech is weeks in the making and subject to many drafts between Biden, his speechwriters and various political and policy officials in the administration.

Last year, Biden’s speech came just days after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and focused heavily on explaining Washington’s response.

The speech is delivered during a joint session of Congress. All members of both the Democratic-controlled Senate and Republican-controlled House are invited. Members of Biden’s Cabinet, the armed forces and the Supreme Court also attend. Partisan outbursts can occur.

Biden was formally invited to give the address earlier in January by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. McCarthy will preside over the event and be accompanied by Vice President Kamala Harris, who is also the president of the Senate.

The president also invites family members and other guests who sit in the First Lady’s view box from the balcony and can be used to amplify points he is making during his speech.

Members of Congress invite guests, too.

This year, guests will include the mother and stepfather of Tyre Nichols, the Black man who was fatally beaten by Memphis police officers, who were invited by Congressional Black Caucus chair Representative Steven Horsford.

One person who does not attend is a single member of Biden’s Cabinet who will be picked as a “designated survivor.” That individual will be housed in a secure location and is tasked with taking over the government in case of a catastrophe that impairs the president and his other successors at the Capitol.

The designated survivor for this year’s speech has not yet been announced.

Republicans have not yet announced who will be picked to give the traditional opposition party response to Biden’s remarks. That speech is generally delivered shortly after the president’s.

(This story has been corrected to specify that Tyre Nichols’ mother and stepfather were invited by Representative Horsford, not Biden, in paragraph 14)

The Memphis Fire Department said on Monday it fired two emergency medical technicians dispatched to the scene of the fatal police beating of Tyre Nichols after finding that the paramedics failed to render adequate medical care to him.

A third member of the Memphis Fire Department, a lieutenant who drove the two paramedics to the scene and remained in her vehicle after arriving, was also dismissed, the department said in a statement.

The move came hours after the Memphis Police Department disclosed that seven of its officers were relieved of duty for their roles in the confrontation that led to the Jan. 10 death of Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man. That total included five officers who previously were dismissed from the force and charged with murder last week.

A sixth officer – identified as Preston Hemphill – was suspended with pay pending a hearing, and a seventh officer who was not immediately identified was relieved of duty without pay, the police department said. No criminal charges have been filed against Hemphill, 26, who joined the force in 2018, or against the seventh, unnamed officer.

A police department spokesperson declined to comment on why suspensions were not announced earlier.

Police Chief Cerelyn Davis has previously said that an unspecified number of officers besides the five initially implicated remained under investigation for policy infractions stemming from the ill-fated arrest of Nichols during a Jan. 7 traffic stop.

The five officers dismissed on Jan. 20 – all of them Black – were charged Thursday with second-degree murder, assault, kidnapping, official misconduct and oppression in the fatal beating of Nichols.

Hemphill, who is white, wore the body-camera that captured the first of four videos released by authorities on Friday of the traffic stop and violent confrontation that followed, according to the officer’s attorney, Lee Gerald.

Nichols arrived at a hospital in critical condition after he was repeatedly pummeled with punches, kicks and blows from a baton, and he died three days later.

EMTs Robert Long and JaMichael Sandridge “failed to conduct an adequate patient assessment” upon seeing the injured Nichols a few minutes after police stopped beating him, Fire Chief Gina Sweat said in a statement.

They were terminated for violating fire department policy along with Michelle Whitaker, a lieutenant in the department who drove them to the scene and remained in the vehicle after arriving, the statement said.

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President Joe Biden’s administration on Monday said it will end COVID-19 emergency declarations on May 11, nearly three years after the United States imposed sweeping pandemic measures to curb the spread of the illness.

The COVID-19 national emergency and public health emergency (PHE) were put in place in 2020 by the administration of then-President Donald Trump. Biden has repeatedly extended the measures, which were set to expire in the coming months.

The White House’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in a statement said the declarations would be extended again until May 11, and then terminated.

“This wind-down would align with the Administration’s previous commitments to give at least 60 days’ notice prior to termination of the PHE,” OMB said in an administration policy statement.

OMB said in a separate statement that Biden would veto a proposed bill in the U.S. Congress that would eliminate COVID-19 vaccine mandates for health care providers working on certain federal programs.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Women whose employers have opted out of covering contraceptives under their health insurance plans on religious grounds would gain no-cost access to birth control under a rule proposed by the Biden administration on Monday.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare, requires private insurance plans to cover recommended preventive services including contraception without any patient cost-sharing, but current regulations grant exemptions for religious or moral objections.

If the new rule is implemented, women enrolled in plans governed by the ACA would gain birth control coverage regardless of employer exemption, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said in a statement.

“Today’s proposed rule works to ensure that the tens of millions of women across the country who have and will benefit from the ACA will be protected. It says to women across the country, we have your back,” said HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra.

Under existing regulations, those enrolled in plans that do not cover contraception on religious or moral grounds can only access contraceptive services through an accommodation that employers can decline to offer.

Under the new rule, a provider would offer contraception at no cost to the employee and be reimbursed by an insurer, who would receive a credit from the government.

The rule would also remove employer moral objections as grounds for exemption from coverage but keep religious ones in place.

More than 1,000 Monday flights into or out of the United States have been canceled due to a severe winter storm, with about half of those coming from Southwest Airlines Co (LUV.N).

A total of 1,019 flights were canceled as of 6:00 pm ET, according to flight-tracking service FlightAware.

Low-cost carrier Southwest earlier this month faced U.S. government backlash for canceling 16,700 flights over the holidays as it grappled with bad weather and outdated technology.

The company has scrapped about 12% of its Monday schedule, while American Airlines Group Inc (AAL.O) has canceled 6%, or 200 flights.

The fresh cancellations come as the U.S. aviation sector recovers from a nationwide ground stop imposed by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) over a computer issue.

For Tuesday so far, 797 flights are scheduled to be canceled into or out of the United States.

Southwest Airlines and other major U.S. airlines have issued winter weather waivers. A waiver allows customers to change their itinerary with no fare differences if they remain in the same cabin as originally booked.

Gotham/GC Images

• Kanye West paid nearly $15,000 to white nationalist Nick Fuentes, per campaign finance records.
• The payment was described as a reimbursement for travel expenses.
• Fuentes traveled with West to meet with former President Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago.

Kanye West has surrounded himself with far-right activists since splitting from his ex-wife Kim Kardashian, even bringing along a Gen Z white nationalist to dinner last fall with former President Donald Trump.

A new filing from the occasional rapper’s presidential campaign shows those relationships have not come cheap.

In a year-end report required by the Federal Election Commission, submitted Monday, West’s 2020 presidential campaign committee revealed a total of $14,719 in payouts to Nick Fuentes, a 24-year-old far-right influencer who has praised Adolf Hitler and organized conferences attended by the likes of Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

The disbursements to Fuentes are labeled as reimbursement for travel expenses, the first such payment, of just over $9,000, coming the same day as the pair met with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort.

West’s campaign also made payments to another far-right provocateur, Milo Yiannopoulous. A former writer for Breitbart, the news site once led by Steve Bannon, Yiannopoulous was a rising star on the right before comments resurfaced in 2017 in which he appeared to defend pedophilia. He reemerged last year when he was hired by Rep. Greene after ostensibly renouncing his homosexuality.

In November 2022, West — who has himself lauded Hitler and vowed to go “death con 3” on Jews — said he was hiring Yiannopoulous to advise him ahead of another presidential run. That lasted about a month before Yiannopoulous announced his departure.

It was a lucrative 30 days for the “ex-gay” activist. According to campaign records, Yiannopoulous pocketed nearly $50,000 from the West campaign: $9,955 for a “Domain Transfer,” dated the same day as the meeting with Trump, and $40,000 in mid-December for “Campaign Wrap Up Services.”

Although West has lost millions of dollars in sponsorships since he began espousing extremist views, his campaign committee reported still having more than $228,000 in cash on hand at the end of last year.

Have a news tip? Email this reporter: cdavis@insider.com

US Army/Sgt. Patrik Orcutt

• US Navy SEALs travel around the world to train with other countries’ special-operations forces.
• In 2022, SEALs in Europe trained with Croatia’s ZSS, a relatively new special-operations unit.
• Through such deployments, SEALs help partners become proficient in new missions and skill sets.

In 2022, a platoon of US Navy SEALs traveled to Croatia and trained with the country’s maritime special-operation unit.

Through these training deployments, US Navy SEALs help new special-operations units to become proficient in new missions and skill sets.

Teaching the ropes to foreign commandos

A member of Croatia’s ZSS provides security during diving ops with members of US Naval Special Warfare in Split in April 2022.

US Army/Sgt. Patrik Orcutt

Established in 2000, the Zapovjedništvo Specialjalnih Snaga — roughly translated as the Special Forces Command — is Croatia’s elite commando force.

Major “Marko,” commander of the ZSS, expanded on the joint training with the US SEALs, saying in a NATO press release that because about 70% of earth is covered by water, proficiency in maritime special operations in critical.

“The water will become our playground,” Marko said.

The joint training, which mainly took place along the Adriatic Sea, included practice in several missions and skill sets. The frogmen conducted long-distance underwater swims with special rebreathers that don’t emanate bubbles, seized bridges by infiltrating from the water, and simulated clandestine landings on enemy beaches.

US Naval Special Warfare personnel conduct maritime Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure training with Croatian ZSS in Split in April 2022.

US Army/Sgt. Patrik Orcutt

Probably one of the hardest mission sets they practiced was maritime counterterrorism — rescuing hostages from a ship captured by terrorists.

“What we teach after depends on the foreign partner in question and what is their strong and weak points,” a former Navy SEAL officer, who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the nature of his current job, told Insider.

The former frogman said that if a special-operations partner wants to work on Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure operations, then “the [SEAL] platoon will help them with that,” but there is usually a combination of marksmanship, close-quarters combat, static-line or freefall parachute jumps, combat dives, explosive breaching, and over-the-beach training.

“We will usually also train with other [special-operations force] units in the country and not just their frogmen,” the former SEAL officer added.

When it comes to progression of training, SEALs use the same “crawl, walk, run” approach they employ in their own training. They have to make sure that their foreign partners are first proficient in the basics before advancing into more complex — and dangerous — skill sets.

A US Naval Special Warfare Task Unit Europe member climbs a ladder during diving ops with Croatia’s ZSS in Split in April 2022.

US Army/Sgt. Patrik Orcutt

“We have to be careful not to offend our foreign partners by seeming to be treating them as amateurs,” the former SEAL officer said, adding that can often be tricky at times because the material can be easy for the US special operators.

But US special operators learn a lot too from these partnerships, which often evolve into an opportunity to share lessons learned.

“The people and the units we work with overseas are already among the best in their militaries. They might not have the same high-tech gear or training as us, but they usually have the same mentality. That makes our job so much easier and rewarding,” a former SEAL officer told Insider.

Same training philosophy

A member of US Naval Special Warfare Task Unit Europe during maritime Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure training with Croatia’s ZSS in Split in April 2022.

US Army/Sgt. Patrik Orcutt

Several of those units share the same training and philosophy as the US Navy SEAL teams, the result of relationships that go back decades.

For example, the Hellenic Navy’s Underwater Demolition Teams, who frequently train with Navy SEALs and Special Warfare Combatant-Craft Crewmen in the Aegean Sea and Eastern Mediterranean, go through the exact basic training to become a frogman as their American counterparts.

In the 1950s, the Hellenic Navy sent two officers to San Diego to go through the US Navy’s Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training. When they graduated with their American classmates, the officers returned to Greece and set up the same training course to become a frogman.

These relationships with foreign special-operations units give US special operators access to almost any region of the world.

Amid ongoing competition with China or Russia, or indeed if there is a conflict with those countries, those ties and that access can truly be golden, giving US commandos easier entry to a country and partners with native understanding of the battlespace.

Stavros Atlamazoglou is a defense journalist specializing in special operations, a Hellenic Army veteran (national service with the 575th Marine Battalion and Army HQ), and a Johns Hopkins University graduate. He is working toward a master’s degree in strategy and cybersecurity at Johns Hopkins’ School of Advanced International Studies.

Impossible Foods

• Impossible Foods is laying off 20% of its workforce, Bloomberg reported Monday.
• The plant-based meat maker has also been offering buyouts to employees since late 2022.
• It’s the third time in a year that Impossible has made cuts as plant-based meat sales slow down.

Impossible Foods is gearing up for its third round of layoffs in roughly a year.

The plant-based meat brand plans to eliminate 20% of its employees, Bloomberg reported on Monday, citing an unnamed source. Going into the layoffs, Impossible employed about 700 people.

Impossible also tried to reduce its headcount at the end of 2022 by offering voluntary buyouts, Bloomberg reported.

A spokeswoman for Impossible Foods did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider.

Just three months ago, the company laid off 6% of its workforce. At the time, CEO Peter McGuinness said in a message to employees that the reductions were part of a reorganization meant to set up the company to “continue to hyper grow.” 

In January 2022, Impossible let go of a smaller group of “fewer than 15” employees, Bloomberg reported at the time.

Layoffs have been one part of a shakeup over the past year at Impossible. Several executives have left the company, and founder and former CEO Pat Brown is on leave from Impossible until this spring. Brown stepped down from the CEO spot in April.

McGuinness, his replacement, is trying to inject more marketing savvy into the brand. 

Plant-based meat sales growth has flattened over the last several months, causing analysts to question the future of the category. Impossible took out a full-page ad in the New York Times earlier this month to counter a Bloomberg Businessweek story’s assertion that plant-based meat is “just another fad.”

But McGuinness acknowledges that Impossible faces real challenges. A majority of US consumers haven’t even heard of the brand, and supermarkets don’t always give Impossible’s products ideal placement in their stores, he told Time Magazine.

Do you work at Impossible or have information to share? Reach out to Alex Bitter at abitter@insider.com or via encrypted messaging app Signal at (808) 854-4501.