Jerome R. Corsi's Blog, page 31

Cracker Barrel caves! Restaurant chain takes Trump’s advice, returns to old logo

(Courtesy Cracker Barrel)

After days of backlash and negative media coverage, restaurant chain Cracker Barrel has scrapped its controversial new logo, returning to the traditional symbol with “Old Timer,” or “Uncle Herschel,” in place.

“We thank your guests for sharing your voices and love for Cracker Barrel,” the restaurant chain posted on X. “We said we would listen, and we have. Our new logo is going away and our ‘Old Timer’ will remain. At Cracker Barrel, it’s always been – and always will be – about serving up delicious food, warm welcomes, and the kind of country hospitality that feels like family.”

We thank our guests for sharing your voices and love for Cracker Barrel. We said we would listen, and we have. Our new logo is going away and our “Old Timer” will remain.

At Cracker Barrel, it’s always been – and always will be – about serving up delicious food, warm… pic.twitter.com/C32QMLOeq0

— Cracker Barrel (@CrackerBarrel) August 26, 2025

For days, the company has taken incoming for its bland new logo, which nixed the “Old Timer” leaning against a barrel, including from the president of the United States.

As WorldNetDaily reported, President Trump posted Tuesday on Truth Social: “Cracker Barrel should go back to the old logo, admit a mistake based on customer response (the ultimate Poll), and manage the company better than ever before.

“They got a Billion Dollars worth of free publicity if they play their cards right. Very tricky to do, but a great opportunity.

“Have a major News Conference today. Make Cracker Barrel a WINNER again.”

The company didn’t have a news conference but has made it known they have taken Trump’s advice.

Promises made, promises kept. @realDonaldTrump has saved Cracker Barrel!

You’re welcome, America! pic.twitter.com/F4Usz6wf8V

— Anna Kelly (@AnnaKelly47) August 26, 2025

The company issued a statement Monday, indicating: “If the last few days have shown us anything, it’s how deeply people care about Cracker Barrel. We’re truly grateful for your heartfelt voices.”

“You’ve also shown us that we could’ve done a better job sharing who we are and who we’ll always be.”

Cracker Barrel has also come under fire for its DEI ideology, which recently has been purged from its website.

‘Very tricky’: President Trump tells Cracker Barrel how to rescue itself from new logo backlash

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A tribute to the man behind Dr. James Dobson

It’s not every day that one gets to see private childhood home movies of someone famous. But I had such a privilege some 30 years ago, when I produced a feature on Dr. James Dobson, who died last week.

He founded and led for decades the worldwide ministry of Focus on the Family, which became a virtual media empire, reaching millions of people worldwide. After he left Focus on the Family, he created “Family Talk with Dr. James Dobson.” I was privileged to be a guest on that program a couple of times.

Gary Bauer, co-author with Dobson, continues programming for “Family Talk with James Dobson,” including broadcasts on our nation’s Christian roots.

But in 1993, I traveled to Colorado Springs to interview him for a Father’s Day TV segment for Coral Ridge Ministries. I’m still with the ministry, which was founded by Dr. D. James Kennedy, who died in 2007. And who delivered Dr. Kennedy’s eulogy? Dr. James Dobson.

The two of them joined forces in the 1990s with evangelical leaders Bill Bright, Larry Burkett, Marlin Maddoux and others to create the pro-religious freedom legal group now known as the Alliance Defending Freedom, or ADF.

But back to 1993. Despite his amazing accomplishments, Dr. James Dobson gave credit first, of course, to the Lord Jesus Christ, but also to one man. His own father, Rev. James Dobson Sr. What follows are some of Dr. Dobson’s (Jr.) remarks from our interview.

His father was a humble evangelist and pastor for the Nazarene denomination in some Western states. He was known for his diligent prayer life.

Dr. Dobson said of him in our interview, “He traveled an awful lot. He was gone for a month or six weeks at a time. But when he came home, he was mine.”

But as the son began to experience his early teens, he began to show signs of mild rebellion. So his father “decisively” changed his plans to devote time to his teenage son.

Dobson told me, “He had a four-year slate of revival meetings scheduled. He was probably the prominent evangelist in his denomination at the time. He instantly canceled that slate, all of those meetings.”

The senior Dobson sold their house, moved the family 700 miles south to Texas, and took a pastorate so that he could be home with James Jr. for the two years of high school. Notes the famous son with great appreciation: “He actually put me ahead of his profession.”

As I was putting this story together for said television segment on Christian TV, Dr. James Dobson lent me access to his private home movies, with the caveat that these scenes could only be used for that particular segment, which I obeyed. What a privilege to see those old black-and-white films of the Dobsons fishing, hiking and so on.

Years went by, and James Dobson Jr. had a family of his own. He earned his Ph.D. in psychology and became a professor of pediatrics at the University of Southern California and a psychologist at Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles. Later, he shifted to the broadcast ministry to reach more people.

But Dr. Dobson was getting so busy that his father became concerned. So the father wrote a letter to his son, which said essentially, “Be careful, you could lose your children” upon “the altar of career ambition.”

Not only did his father help Jim Dobson focus on his own family, but he also helped play a key behind-the-scenes role in his son’s ministry. When the elder Dobson was fasting and praying at age 66 for direction for the rest of his life, he felt as if he heard from the Lord: “I know your love for My people. I know your love for the Gospel, and I’m going to answer your prayer, and you’re going to reach millions of people, coast to coast and around the world. I’m going to bless your ministry around the world, but it is not going to be through you. It is going to be through your son.” The next day, his father had a massive heart attack from which he never recovered.

The son never even learned about this insight his father received until he was told about it by his aunt seven years later. And the son recognized that his Dad played a pivotal role in the amazingly impactful ministry. Dobson said, “It really is true that this ministry is a product of my father’s ministry and especially of his prayer life.”

With the death of Dr. Dobson last week, we lost a great man. He reminded us of our need to focus on the family – a message modern America needs now more than ever. As has been said so well: “As the family goes, so goes the nation.”

A giant’s passing

Years ago, when I was an editor at the Los Angeles Times, I learned just how out of touch the media were with the growing evangelical Christian world.

Walter Martin, the original radio “Bible Answer Man,” had died, and a reporter had compiled an obituary. The article quoted several of Mr. Martin’s admirers, including James C. Dobson, who was described only as a “radio preacher from Pomona.”

Well, that wasn’t quite accurate. The man still known to millions as “Dr. Dobson” was indeed on the radio and was operating out of Pomona, California. But he was not an ordained minister. He was a Christian psychologist specializing in family dynamics who had built a broadcasting empire through his Focus on the Family daily radio program and his best-selling books.

Literally millions of parents, including my wife and me, saw him as a lifeline for helping them through every sort of family situation, from raising toddlers to dealing with teenagers.

When he turned his attention to America’s culture wars in the early 1980s, he became one of the Left’s most formidable opponents and a major ally of Ronald Reagan.

After Jimmy Carter’s White House Conference on Families in 1980, he and other Christian leaders decided some balance was needed in the nation’s capital.

So, they founded the Family Research Council under the leadership of Gerald Regier in 1983. It merged with Focus on the Family in 1988 under former Ronald Reagan aide Gary Bauer and was spun off as an independent think tank in 1992. Tony Perkins has headed it since 2003.

Working in tandem, Focus and FRC have made the case for the crucial role of marriage and families and took on major cultural issues such as abortion, pornography, the LGBTQ movement, and threats to religious liberty.

At the height of his influence during the 1980s and ’90s, Dr. Dobson could shut down the Capitol Hill switchboard by asking his radio listeners to call their representatives.

In 1991, Focus on the Family outgrew its headquarters in Pomona and moved to Colorado Springs, where it continues today as a major radio, streaming, and publishing ministry.

Mr. Dobson reluctantly left Focus in 2009 and started a new radio ministry, Family Talk, which quickly found a large following. Later, he founded the James Dobson Family Institute, where Mr. Bauer serves as senior vice president of public policy in addition to his own organizations, American Values and Campaign for Working Families.

Over the years, Mr. Dobson worked alongside other major influencers like American Family Association founder Don Wildmon, Liberty University and Moral Majority founder Jerry Falwell, Free Congress Foundation founder Paul Weyrich, Concerned Women for America founder Beverly LaHaye, Coral Ridge Ministries founder D. James Kennedy, and Campus Crusade for Christ founder Bill Bright, among others.

“In the 1990s he played a key role in persuading millions of evangelicals to become politically active,” said former California legislator Steve Baldwin, also a former executive director of the Council for National Policy.

“Indeed, I would argue that the coalition he contributed to forming eventually led to the Tea Party movement and then to the MAGA movement.”

Focus on the Family and the Focus-affiliated conservative state policy councils were instrumental in passing state constitutional marriage amendments and the federal Defense of Marriage Act in 1986. Mr. Dobson’s wife Shirley Dobson led the National Day of Prayer observances for 25 years.

Mr. Dobson also helped found the Alliance Defense Fund (now Alliance Defending Freedom, ADF), which provides legal help to Christians who face discrimination for their faith. The ADF represented Colorado baker Jack Phillips, who won a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2018 over his right not to be forced to bake a cake for a same-sex ceremony and then again in 2024 over a transgender cake demand.

Dr. Dobson earned his doctorate in psychology from the University of Southern California and worked at Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles. He saw psychology as a way of understanding human motivation and giving people a set of tools, enhanced by biblical insights, to cope with life. He discarded anything that conflicted with his strong, Christ-centered worldview.

In 1970, he published “Dare to Discipline” (1970), which sent liberals over the edge because he endorsed the careful use of spanking.

He wrote many other books, including co-authoring “Children at Risk” in 1990 with Mr. Bauer. The best-seller predicted the fallout we’re seeing now from values-free sex education and mistaken notions about human nature.

Perhaps the most comforting and beautiful book by Mr. Dobson is the small devotional “In the Arms of God.” Each page has a moral insight and Bible verse and spectacular photos of mountains and other natural beauty.

One entry is this:

“If you could fully comprehend how deeply you are loved by God, you would never feel alone again.”

The accompanying photo is of a pristine mountain lake. The Bible verse is: “For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward them that fear Him” (Psalm 103:11).

On Thursday, Dr. Dobson passed away at the age of 89. A Christian gentleman, he was a fierce warrior for everything good and decent.

My family – and country – are far better off for his willingness to dedicate his life to preserving faith, family, and freedom.

A giant of his time, James C. Dobson now knows more about God than all of us put together.

This column was first published at the Washington Times.

Jewish liberals defend their ‘religion’

In 1993, I gave a speech to The Heritage Foundation in Washington titled “Making Sense of Jewish Liberalism.” I explained that for secular Jews, liberalism was a substitute religion that was in no way connected to authentic Judaism.

What was absurd in 1993 has become suicidal in 2025. With Israel fighting for its survival and American Jews besieged, Jewish liberals cling more tenaciously than ever to their ersatz religion.

The United Jewish Appeal/Jewish Federation of New York is donating $1 million in humanitarian aid for the residents of the Gaza Strip – the same people who put Hamas into power and still condone the atrocities of Oct. 7, 2023, such as the beheadings of Jewish babies in front of their mothers.

While observing that Hamas was responsible for the war in Gaza, UJA-Federation of New York CEO Eric Goldstein insisted, “We must hold tight to what has always anchored the Jewish people: the belief that all human life is sacred.”

Mr. Goldstein forgot an important qualifier: “innocent” human life. Were the lives of Nazi concentration guards sacred? Are the lives of Hamas terrorists sacred? Mr. Goldstein is quoting the Torah of Temple Beth.

Judaism has always distinguished between the innocent and those who gang rape and sexually mutilate captives. The only ones starving in Gaza are Israeli hostages. An Aug. 18 editorial in the New York Post asks, “With every photo of a ‘starving’ Gazan proving fake, how can you believe famine claims?”

UJA has a policy of not helping Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria, home to half a million Jews and erroneously designated the “occupied territories.” It won’t build a playground in the settlement of Kiryat Arba, but it will send truckloads of food, which probably will be stolen by Hamas, to Gaza.

This is standard operating procedure for Jewish liberals.

In 2020, while U.S. cities were burning, 600 Jewish organizations took out a full-page ad in The New York Times (their Holy of Holies) in support of the antisemitic Black Lives Matter movement. For these Jewish leaders, virtue-signaling always trumps the safety of the community they claim to represent.

Their response to Marxist New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, a clear and present danger to American Jews and to Israel, can be understood only in this context. Except for the Anti-Defamation League, there has been nothing but crickets from this quarter since the Democratic primary.

Jewish officeholders are even worse. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, co-chair of the Congressional Jewish Caucus, who is terrified of being primaried out of office, kissed the liberal ring and endorsed state Rep. Mamdani. Although stopping short of an endorsement, Senate Democratic Leader Charles E. Schumer praised Mr. Mamdani for “running an impressive campaign that connected with New Yorkers.”

In 1932, Adolf Hitler ran an impressive campaign that connected with the German people.

No major party candidate for an important office has ever been as manifestly hostile to Israel and Jews as the Democratic nominee for mayor of the city with the largest Jewish population in the world.

Mr. Mamdani has accused Israel of committing genocide in Gaza. He supports the Boycott, Sanctions and Divestment movement, which seeks to economically emasculate Israel. He says he supports Israel’s right to exist, but not as a Jewish state. This is akin to saying one supports America’s right to exist, but not as a constitutional republic.

He avoided condemning the Oct. 7, 2023, atrocities by saying he mourned the “hundreds of people killed across Israel and Palestine in the last 36 hours.” Really? Did Hamas butcher civilians in Gaza City and Ramallah?

He added that he was sure Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would use the attack as an excuse to increase the violence, just as Franklin D. Roosevelt used Pearl Harbor as an excuse to go to war with Japan.

Mr. Mamdani refuses to condemn the phrase “globalize the intifada,” which ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt decries as “an explicit call for violence” that “celebrates and glorifies savagery and terror.”

As a member of the New York State Assembly, Mr. Mamdani refused to sign a resolution memorializing the Holocaust.

Despite all this, one poll shows Commissar Mamdani with a 17-point lead among Jewish voters.

Liberalism is the perfect pseudo-religion for alienated Jews. It substitutes leftist dogma for biblical truth and offers a vision of the promised land as a woke utopia.

Jews for Mamdani and Useful Idiots to Aid Palestine are like Catholics for Choice on Abortion. Their real religion negates their ostensible faith.

This column was first published at the Washington Times.

‘It’s just so sad’: High-school girls’ volleyball team keeps ‘winning’ due to safety forfeits

Air Force’s Ashley Bible spikes the ball during a game against Fresno State University at the U.S. Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Thursday, Oct. 17, 2024. (U.S. Air Force photo by Trevor Cokley)

A high-school girls’ volleyball team hasn’t played all its scheduled games recently but keeps “winning” thanks to opponents forfeiting – due to a biological boy playing on the team.

Jurupa Valley High School in Riverside County, California, includes on its team AB Hernandez, a biological male “identifying” as a girl. In the name of safety, other teams have forfeited games, the latest being Orange Vista High School.

According to the U.K.’s GBN, the decision emerged following deliberations between student-athletes and their coaching staff regarding the scheduled Aug. 29 match.

Orange Vista emphasized that student welfare remained their primary concern throughout the decision-making process.

Riverside Poly High School initially brought attention to the issue after forfeiting its Aug. 15 match against Jurupa Valley.

“After thoughtful discussions our student-athletes had with coaching staff, it was decided to cancel our upcoming Girls’ Varsity volleyball match against Jurupa Valley High School,” said a statement from Orange Vista.

AB Hernandez

The report notes that Jurupa Valley High School defended its having a male on the roster by stating that they must comply with California state law protecting students from gender identity discrimination.

The district referenced California Education Code 221.5 (f), which mandates student participation on athletic teams matching their “gender identity.”

According to his mother, Nereyda Hernandez, AB doesn’t know the reason for the forfeits, i.e., his presence on the team.

“I understand the discomfort some may feel, because I was once there, too. The difference is, I chose to learn, to grow, and to open my heart,” she explained to GBN.

“This is a child, and I can assure you that she sees your daughters as peers, as teammates, as friends, not through a lens of anything inappropriate,” she stated.

Jurupa Valley High School told Fox News, “We understand and acknowledge the disappointment of our Jurupa Valley High School athletes who are ready and prepared to play. Decisions to cancel matches were made by teams in other districts.”

Hernandez is the athlete who drew controversy last spring when he competed and won several track and field competitions in California girls’ events, including two state titles.

A teammate of Hernandez, Alyssa McPherson, told Fox News it isn’t fair for the other players, stating, “I just feel like it’s so unfair that not only am I missing out on my senior season, but my other teammates, our JV team, and our freshmen team aren’t playing either. And it’s just so disheartening that they’re not gonna have a season and we just want to be able to compete, play, and have fun.”

She continued, “To me, I feel like this is just a fairness issue. … It’s just so sad.”

Since taking office in January, President Trump has taken action to try to inhibit the practice of boys playing on girls’ sports teams and the presence of opposite-sex athletes in locker rooms. Multiple states and school districts have taken legal action against executive orders and other actions of the White House.

?FIVE California girls’ volleyball teams have forfeited games because Jurupa Valley High School insists on letting a MALE play on the girls’ team.

Girls are losing their chance to compete for this nonsense.

When will @CAgovernor stop this madness?! pic.twitter.com/5pM5XjBYQU

— American Principles Project (@approject) August 25, 2025

‘Macabre’: Bill Gates reportedly funded project to embalm newborn baby corpses for tissue harvesting

Bill Gates

A new report from Substack author Jon Fleetwood, of JonFleetwood,com, charges that a “macabre” project funded by Bill Gates, “chemically embalms newborn corpses for weeks to harvest tissues for AI, forensics, and global surveillance.”

The study was called “Exploring minimially invasive tissue sampling as an alternative to conventional autopsy in neonatal deaths,” and appeared just days ago in “Forensic Science, Medicine and Pathology.”

The Substack report explained the embalming and preservation was done on dead newborns “so their organs could be harvested, catalogued, and standardized into databases tied to artificial intelligence, forensic investigations, and global mortality surveillance programs.”

The author explained, “The new study comes after Gates financed the ‘Baby Open Brains’ project, where researchers at the Masonic Institute for the Developing Brain released MRI scans of infants as young as one month old into global AI databases to build the backbone for a nationwide government brain-tracking program.”

The report warned the new program followed a Gates-funded tuberculosis vaccine trial in South Africa that left 260 previously healthy children infected with TB.

It also accused Gates of backing gain-of-function schemes, those research projects in which scientists take a deadly disease and work to make it deadlier, or more infectious.

The report charged:

The new Forensic Science, Medicine and Pathology study recruited 100 dead infants from the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at Kasturba Medical College in Manipal, India. According to the authors, ‘The neonates were recruited from the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) Department of Pediatrics. CDA and MITS were conducted at the Centre for Foetal and Perinatal Pathology, Department of Pathology, after obtaining written informed consent from parents/guardians.’

Stillbirths, macerated babies (stillborn infants whose bodies had already decomposed in the womb), and fetuses were excluded. These were live-born infants, mostly premature and extremely low-birth weight, who died shortly after delivery.

The report said that instead of traditional autopsies, researchers used biopsy needles to pierce the brain, lungs, liver and more, for study.

The bodies were injected with formalin for preservative.

“In plain terms, newborn corpses were chemically embalmed for up to two months while researchers harvested their tissues,” the report said.

Despite the study’s own documentation of failures, the assessment was that the technique was “feasible.”

A report at LifeNews said, “The initiative … could spark outrage among those who view it as a disturbing exploitation of vulnerable lives.”

“The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is funding a gruesome study that involves embalming dead babies with plastic to harvest their tissues for AI forensics and surveillance,” warned Modernity.

LifeNews added, “The Gates Foundation’s involvement is seen as particularly troubling given its history of funding abortion.”

Lawyers for special counsel who ran lawfare cases against Trump claim he did everything right

Jack Smith

Former special counsel Jack Smith, the lawyer appointed by Joe Biden’s attorney general, Merrick Garland, to run several lawfare cases against President Donald Trump, was doing everything exactly right, according to his lawyers.

They have submitted a letter defending Smith, who now is being investigated on allegations he violated the Hatch Act while creating charges to file against Trump.

The Hatch Act prevents federal employees from engaging in partisan political actions while being paid by taxpayers.

Smith came under investigation after Sen. Tom Cottyon delivered a referral to the Office of Special Counsel regarding Smith’s politicized cases. The accusations are that Smith ran his cases in ways to harm Trump’s 2024 election campaign.

Smith filed charges against Trump based on his handling of classified documents and for his actions on January 6, 2021, which Smith claimed was an attempt to overturn the 2020 election.

Both cases since have been dismissed.

But the New York Post noted an email confirms the Hatch Act Unit, which enforces a law restricting government employees from engaging in political activities, has begun reviewing Smith.

“Jack Smith’s actions were clearly driven to hurt President Trump’s election, and Smith should be held fully accountable,” said Cotton, the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, in a statement to the Post.

Smith indicted Trump on 37 federal counts in Miami in June 2023 for lawfully storing presidential records at his Mar-a-Lago estate which was protected by Secret Service agents. Ironically, this was developing at the same time it was revealed Joe Biden had boxes and boxes of secret government documents stored in an office, his home, even his unsecured garage, but no action was taken against him.

That case against Trump later was dismissed because Smith’s appointment as special counsel was improper.

In the second case in Washington D.C., Jack Smith indicted Trump on four counts: Conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding, and conspiracy against rights.

That’s even though evidence about the protest-turned-riot on that day confirmed that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi admitted liability for the events, and Trump had urged his fans to protest “peacefully.”

Smith’s lawyers now have claimed, “We are aware of no court decision, prior Office of Special Counsel finding, or other authority interpreting the Hatch Act to prohibit prosecutors from investigating allegations of criminal conduct committed by former public officials or candidates for public office, or prosecuting those cases when the facts and law so dictate.”

A report at the Gateway Pundit described how Smith “lashed out” at the Office of Special Counsel” for its investigation.

Smith’s lawyers claim he made his decisions “based solely on the evidence.”

‘Don’t hurt kids,’ 44 attorneys general warn

A group of 44 state and territory attorneys general sent a letter Monday warning artificial intelligence companies of the consequences of exploiting kids online.

The letter, sent to 13 major tech and AI companies, including Google and Meta, points to recent examples of AI chatbots engaging in inappropriate conversations with kids online.

Among examples cited are the discovery of internal Meta documents that “revealed the company’s approval of AI Assistants that ‘flirt and engage in romantic roleplay with children’ as young as eight.”

In April, the documents led Sens. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., to demand accountability from the company. In May, the two reintroduced the Kids Online Safety Act, which establishes guidelines to protect kids from harmful content online. The bill is stalled in committee.

Now, the bipartisan coalition of attorneys general says they are resolved “to use every facet of… [their] authority to protect children from exploitation by predatory artificial intelligence products.”

Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti said in a statement, “AI tools can radically reshape our world for the better, but they can also present threats to kids that are more immediate, more personal, and more dangerous than any prior technology.”

“If we can’t steer innovation away from hurting kids, that’s not progress—it’s a plague,” Skrmetti said.

“Don’t hurt kids,” the attorneys write. “That’s an easy bright line that lets you know exactly how to proceed.”

The letter concludes, “We wish you all success in the race for AI dominance. But we are paying attention. If you knowingly harm kids, you will answer for it.”

Google and Meta did not respond to a request for comment.

[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by The Daily Signal.]

Sean Duffy to states: Enforce English proficiency for truckers or lose federal money

(The Center Square) – California, New Mexico and Washington could risk losing federal funding if they fail to enforce English language proficiency requirements for commercial motor vehicle drivers, U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said Tuesday.

The move comes on the heels of an Aug. 12 deadly Florida Turnpike crash involving an 18-wheeler making an unauthorized U-turn. The driver, Harjinder Singh, failed an ELP assessment during an interview with the Federal Motor Carrier Administration following the accident. Singh missed 10 of 12 verbal questions on the proficiency test and was only able to correctly identify one of four traffic signs, according to officials.

During a Tuesday morning news conference, Duffy said the DOT is giving the three states 30 days to comply before withholding “up to 100% of funding” from the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program.

“States don’t get to pick and choose which federal safety rules to follow,” said Duffy. “As we saw with the horrific Florida crash that killed three, when states fail to enforce the law, they put the driving public in danger. Under President Trump’s leadership, we are taking aggressive action to close these safety gaps, hold states accountable, and make sure every commercial driver on the road is qualified to operate a 40-ton vehicle.”

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy

The DOT says that an investigation by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration found “significant failures” by the three states to “properly place drivers out-of-service for ELP violations.” They added that the California Highway Patrol has “publicly stated it has no intention of following this important federal regulation.”

The DOT noted multiple ELP violations involving the three states between June 25 and Aug. 12. Duffy signed an order in May providing guidelines to “strengthen” English proficiency enforcement for truckers.

Three states identified as failing to comply with @FMCSA’s English proficiency requirements for commercial drivers:

Washington, California, and New Mexico.

Failing to follow the rules puts all of us on the road at risk. @USDOT is taking action today to hold those states… pic.twitter.com/Kbfz1VN7Si

— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) August 26, 2025

The secretary’s latest announcement comes as Duffy pushes a DOT nationwide audit of “non-domiciled commercial driver’s license issuance.”

Singh was ruled to be an unauthorized alien by Florida Judge Lauren Sweet. Singh reportedly entered the U.S. via the southern border illegally in 2018 and was able to obtain a CDL in California. His attempts to obtain work authorization were rejected in 2020 by the first Trump administration, according to Homeland Security.

Singh is due back in court on Wednesday and is facing six charges – three each of vehicular homicide and manslaughter. He was denied bail after being deemed a “flight risk.”

This story originally appeared in The Center Square.

‘I’m getting emotional’: Dem plays world’s smallest violin for illegals housed at Alligator Alcatraz

President Donald Trump participates in a walking tour of the immigration detention center nicknamed ‘Alligator Alcatraz,’ Tuesday, July 1, 2025, in Ochopee, Florida. (Official White House photo by Daniel Torok)

A delegate at the Democratic National Committee’s summer meeting labeled a prominent immigration detention facility a “concentration camp” on Tuesday.

United States District Judge Kathleen Williams of the Southern District of Florida, an Obama appointee, ordered the shutdown of “Alligator Alcatraz,” a detention facility for illegal immigrants run by the state of Florida, Thursday, according to Forbes. A delegate from Florida, Millie Herrera, cited the ruling as she spoke on an amendment to a resolution.

WATCH:

“I’d also like to make comments about this. I refuse to call it Alligator Alcatraz, I think that it is insulting and disgusting and inhumane what they are doing to immigrants all over the country,” Herrera claimed after reading the proposed amendment. “This is a concentration camp. There have been several reports that people that are legal residents, even citizens detained without access to due process and their attorneys cannot visit them. There are 30 men to a cage with only three toilets; drinking water comes out the top of the toilet. They’re not allowed to bathe. It is the most incredible and cruel situation in a country where a lot of us, many of us, even from the first immigrants who came into the country from… England, we’re all immigrants except for the natives.”

“I think we need to call out this injustice and this persecution of people, and the only reason we are here is to improve our country and make sure that we contribute and our children have good lives,” Herrera continued. “This is just unbelievable to a lot of us that have experienced persecution and other countries that fled to the United States, thinking that we were protected here by our Constitution. So, we are all together in this and I, you know, really appreciate all your support and I’m getting emotional, sorry, the support that immigrants are receiving from our party, because the Democratic Party is the party of immigrants, the party of working class, the party of women, the party of LGBTQ, the party for everybody, so thank you and please offer this amendment.”

Environmental groups sued to block the facility, which the Trump administration approved in June following a suggestion by Republican Attorney General James Uthmeier of Florida.

Addressing illegal immigration has been a priority of the Trump administration, with President Donald Trump issuing several executive orders to address illegal immigration and border security, including one designating Mexican drug cartels, the Venezuelan prison gang Tren de Aragua (TdA) and the El Salvadoran prison gang MS-13 as foreign terrorist organizations upon taking office Jan. 20.

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