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California seizes 63,000 pounds of illegal cannabis worth $104 million in major crackdown
California authorities seized more than 63,000 pounds of illegal cannabis worth over $104 million, along with firearms and cash, during a three-month crackdown targeting organized criminal networks across the state.
Between April and June, authorities carried out enforcement operations across 10 counties, eradicating more than 89,000 cannabis plants, confiscating 17 firearms, seizing more than $220,000 in cash and making 24 arrests, according to Gov. Gavin Newsom's office.
Since Newsom established the state's Unified Cannabis Enforcement Task Force in 2022, California has seized and destroyed more than 841,000 pounds of illicit cannabis valued at more than $1.3 billion.
"Disrupting the illegal cannabis market is about more than seizing unlicensed products – it’s about taking on criminal networks, removing illegal firearms out of the hands of dangerous individuals, and stopping activity that threatens public safety," Newsom said in a statement.
"Through strong multiagency collaboration, California is making clear: if you threaten our communities, we will act," he added.
The largest enforcement operation took place between May 14 and June 3 across the southern Central Valley and northern Antelope Valley, where the California Department of Fish and Wildlife led a multiagency effort serving 26 search warrants at illegal cannabis sites in Tulare, Kern and Los Angeles counties.
Authorities eradicated nearly 24,000 cannabis plants, destroyed roughly 3,700 pounds of processed cannabis, seized cash, and arrested or cited multiple individuals.
Investigators also uncovered numerous environmental violations, including 13 cultivation sites where banned, unregistered or foreign-labeled pesticides were found or suspected.
Kern County accounted for the largest seizure during the three-month operation, with authorities confiscating more than 25,000 pounds of illegal cannabis valued at $41.5 million and destroying 26,442 plants.
Authorities also seized more than 14,500 pounds of illegal cannabis in Alameda County, valued at more than $24 million.
California Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Meghan Hertel said investigators routinely find restricted pesticides at illegal grow sites tied to organized criminal enterprises.
She warned the toxic chemicals threaten wildlife and can also pose a risk to consumers because illegally grown cannabis isn't tested for safety.
America is fighting yesterday’s AI war. Tomorrow’s war is on the way
For more than two decades on the Army Staff, part of my job was recommending which nations received American weapons, training and doctrine, and which did not. The choice rarely came down to which weapon system performed best on a range. It came down to alliance.
A country that trained on American equipment, spoke our tactical language and built its systems around our supply chains stayed tied to Washington for a generation. One that turned to Moscow or Beijing drifted into someone else’s orbit.
That lesson has stayed with me. Great powers rarely prevail because they possess the single best weapon; they prevail because other nations choose to build their militaries, economies, and, ultimately, their futures around their systems. Washington risks forgetting that lesson in today’s race to build the world’s dominant computing platform.
ROBERT MAGINNIS: TRUMP’S ANKARA REMARKS REVEAL A GRAND STRATEGY HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT
While Washington argues over which chatbot drafts the sharper essay, Beijing is building something far more ambitious than a single flagship model. That distinction separates today’s technology race from tomorrow’s world order. Consider that China’s Huawei is preparing to double production of its Ascend processors in 2026, pushing toward 1.6 million chips, and Chinese developers at DeepSeek have already tuned their newest models to run specifically on that Huawei silicon.
SEN TODD YOUNG: THE HIDDEN DANGER CHINA’S SHIPS COULD BRING TO OUR SHORES
Meanwhile, congressional hearings and cable news segments keep asking which model scores highest on the latest benchmark, an interesting question but not the decisive one.
History’s great wars were won not by the single best weapon, but by nations able to generate energy, build factories and produce the industrial output needed to prevail.
CHINA’S ROBOT-RUN HOTEL OPENS TO PUBLIC IN 2027
This technology is no different.
America is treating this contest as a technology race. China is treating it as a civilization-building project.
The mistake Washington keeps making is assuming there is a single technology race. There isn’t. There are multiple competitions unfolding simultaneously, each reinforcing the others.
National competitiveness in this contest rests on what I call the AI Power Stack: interdependent layers that together determine technological power. Everything begins with abundant, reliable electricity. The newest data centers can draw more than a gigawatt each, roughly the output of a nuclear reactor, and China now generates more than twice as much electric power as the United States, power its centralized system can direct toward computing clusters far more easily than our fragmented grid allows.
Above energy sits semiconductors, the steel mills of the digital age. America’s effort to rebuild domestic chip manufacturing is genuine progress.
Above the chips sits computing infrastructure: the data centers, networking and cooling that turn processors into usable capability. Only once those foundations exist do the models built atop them become decisive, and models are almost all what Washington debates.
Above the models sit applications: the factories, hospitals, farms and command posts where this technology gets used. And above every layer sits the one Washington discusses least: the ecosystem of developers, companies, universities, investors and allied nations that decide which technology becomes the world’s standard.
China is not merely trying to invent tomorrow’s technology. It is trying to become the platform upon which tomorrow’s technology operates.
Beijing grasps that top layer better than Washington credits it. Rather than chasing a single breakthrough model, Chinese firms are pricing their models aggressively, betting that adoption compounds over time.
By February 2026, Chinese open-source models were drawing more weekly token traffic on the world’s largest model marketplace than American models, with four of the five most-used systems globally built in China. One venture capital partner has estimated that most American startups now build on Chinese base models simply because they are cheaper to run.
Banks in Singapore, telecom carriers in Indonesia, and government platforms in Malaysia are already operating on Chinese models and Huawei hardware. History suggests the technologies that reshape civilization are rarely the ones engineers admire most. They are the ones businesses, governments and consumers adopt, and continue building upon, for decades.
This pattern is not new. The internet did not prevail because it was the most secure network ever engineered. It prevailed because millions of people built on it. Cloud computing reshaped global commerce for the same reason. This technology will follow the identical path.
That reality explains why today’s debate over open and closed models is far more than a technical disagreement. Closed models emphasize security, control and carefully managed deployment. Open models let universities, startups and allied nations build new applications and accelerate adoption.
The debate is not simply about protecting intellectual property. It is about determining whose technology ecosystem the next billion users, and the nations they inhabit, will trust. That larger strategic competition is one I explored in greater detail in my book, "The New AI Cold War: Liberty vs. Tyranny in the Age of Machine Empires."
Washington is not standing still. President Donald Trump’s AI Action Plan, released in July 2025, directs the Commerce and State Departments to assemble full-stack American export packages: hardware, models, software and standards bundled together for allies and partners abroad. That is precisely the right instinct.
That strategy recognizes the central truth of this race: America cannot export chips alone; it must export an entire technology ecosystem.
It treats this technology the way effective security cooperation treats weapons systems: as a decades-long relationship, not a single sale.
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But the plan will only succeed if Washington backs it with the same urgency it gives defense budgets and semiconductor legislation: faster permitting for energy generation and transmission, sustained investment in domestic chip manufacturing and a willingness to compete on price, not just capability, in the developing markets China is actively courting.
The nation that wins the AI Cold War will not necessarily build the smartest chatbot. It will build the ecosystem the rest of the world chooses to trust, adopt and expand. History suggests that once those ecosystems take root, they shape alliances, commerce, military power and political influence for generations.
Right now, Beijing appears to understand that reality better than Washington. America still holds the strategic advantage, but only if it recognizes the true battlefield before the decisive campaigns have already begun.
Trump calls terrorist Iranian a ‘cancer.’ Is he finally the one to remove it?
President Donald Trump’s remarks on the sidelines of the NATO Summit in Ankara, Turkey, may represent one of the most consequential shifts in America’s strategic language toward the Islamic Republic of Iran since the 1979 revolution.
By warning that any new Iranian attack would trigger a far more devastating response — and by describing the regime as a "cancer" that must be removed — Trump signaled something that goes beyond conventional political rhetoric. In the language of national security, such terminology often reflects a fundamental change in how a threat is defined.
For more than four decades, U.S. policy toward the Islamic Republic has centered on containment and deterrence. The underlying assumption was that Tehran’s behavior could be influenced, constrained or made more costly. Trump’s remarks suggest a different premise: the issue is no longer merely the regime’s behavior, but the system itself. The objective is no longer to manage the crisis, but to eliminate its source — raising once again the prospect of regime change as a strategic outcome.
ROBERT MAGINNIS: TRUMP’S ANKARA REMARKS REVEAL A GRAND STRATEGY HIDING IN PLAIN SIGHT
This shift is rooted Iran’s own record. Hostility toward the United States, the declared objective of Israel’s destruction, the expansion of proxy networks and the systematic export of instability have defined its regional posture. Vast national resources that belonged to the Iranian people were redirected toward missiles, proxy militias and ideological warfare, while economic decline, corruption and declining living standards spread at home. The result has been a cycle in which regional conflict and domestic deterioration reinforce one another.
Following the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and amid Washington’s changing posture, a central question emerges: Is the United States moving beyond containment toward what could be described as a doctrine of strategic surgery? If so, this would represent more than a military adjustment; it would signal the emergence of a doctrine aimed at dismantling one of the most entrenched sources of instability in the modern Middle East.
ISRAEL FORTIFIES BORDER WITH JORDAN AS IRAN SEEKS NEW TERROR PATH
To understand the weight of Trump’s remarks, one must examine the strategic trajectory of the Islamic Republic. After the Iran-Iraq War, and especially following Khamenei’s consolidation of power in 1989, the regime shifted away from reconstruction toward a long-term ideological and geopolitical project. Its aim was to position itself as the central force within a transnational network spanning the Shiite Crescent and beyond.
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its Quds Force developed an extensive infrastructure across Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Gaza. Through these networks, Tehran extended its influence while simultaneously undermining regional stability and challenging U.S. interests. Over time, proxy warfare became not just a tactic, but a defining feature of the regime’s strategic identity.
The domestic cost has been severe. Enormous financial resources were diverted toward military expansion, nuclear ambitions and external operations, while Iran’s economy weakened under inflation, capital flight and systemic corruption. The pursuit of "strategic depth" ultimately ensured that the consequences of exported conflict would return inward.
ROUND ONE OF IRAN FIGHT WENT TO THE US MILITARY. BUT ENDING THINGS IS MUCH HARDER
For this reason, describing the Islamic Republic as a "cancer" should not be interpreted as a reference to a single leader. It reflects a judgment about an entire system — one that has institutionalized instability. Any meaningful "surgery" would therefore have to address the full structure that sustains this doctrine, rather than just its most visible figure.
What distinguishes Trump’s language is not only its intensity, but its strategic implication. Within national security discourse, defining a threat as a "cancer" implies that it cannot be indefinitely managed. It must be removed at its source. If this framing evolves into policy, the objective shifts from containment to dismantlement.
Such an approach does not necessarily imply full-scale war or occupation. In strategic terms, it would involve a coordinated application of political, intelligence, economic, cyber and military tools designed to degrade and ultimately dismantle the regime’s capacity to generate instability. The goal would not simply be to punish, but to prevent regeneration.
Over decades, the Islamic Republic has constructed a multilayered system of resilience: the IRGC, the Quds Force, proxy networks, missile and nuclear programs, intelligence services, propaganda institutions and financial structures. Targeting individual components has repeatedly proven insufficient. Limited actions may delay threats, but they have not eliminated them.
If Trump’s remarks translate into doctrine, the United States may be entering a new strategic phase — one focused on dismantling the system itself rather than managing its behavior. In that context, the concept of "The Greatest Surgery of the Century" moves from metaphor toward operational principle.
History offers a cautionary lesson: removing a regime without a viable plan for what follows can produce instability, fragmentation and new forms of extremism. Iraq after Saddam Hussein and Libya after Muammar Qaddafi illustrate how power vacuums can generate prolonged disorder.
The Islamic Republic is not merely a governing authority; it is an integrated system of military, ideological, economic and security institutions. The IRGC, Basij, financial networks, and regional proxies function as an interconnected ecosystem. Partial disruption would likely allow the system to reconstitute itself.
For that reason, any successful strategy must combine dismantling the regime’s coercive and expansionist structures with a credible political transition grounded in national sovereignty and the rule of law. The objective is not retribution, but to break a cycle that has linked Iran’s internal stagnation with regional instability.
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It is equally important to distinguish between Iran and the Islamic Republic. The primary victims of this system have been the Iranian people themselves, whose resources and future were sacrificed to ideological ambitions and external conflicts.
If Trump’s remarks indeed signal a new doctrine, its success will not be measured solely by immediate outcomes, but by whether it permanently removes the regime’s capacity to regenerate instability while enabling the emergence of a stable and responsible Iranian state. The Iranian people have repeatedly indicated their desire for an alternative rooted in accountability and normalcy.
If this moment represents the beginning of a strategic transformation, the Middle East may be approaching its most significant geopolitical shift since the end of the Cold War. In that case, "The Greatest Surgery of the Century" will not simply describe a policy — it will define an era.
Ukraine’s drone revolution shows Russia is dangerously unprepared. But, so is America
Russian missiles and Iranian-supplied drones continue to slam into Ukrainian hospitals and apartment blocks with regularity. These are not precision strikes aimed at military targets; they are clumsy, often wildly inaccurate terror attacks designed to break the will of the Ukrainian people.
In this, they echo the Nazi V-1 and V-2 "vengeance weapons" of 1944-45. Those terror weapons killed thousands of civilians in London and Antwerp, but achieved little militarily. They also mirror the Luftwaffe’s Blitz on British cities in 1940. The bombs fell — but British resolve only hardened.
The same dynamic is playing out now in Ukraine. Every Russian strike on civilians strengthens Ukrainian determination to fight on.
Meanwhile, Ukraine has seized the initiative with a weapon the Russians has yet to counter: massed, AI-enabled drones and long-range cruise missiles produced at scale and employed with laser-like focus for operational and strategic effect.
Operationally, Ukrainian strikes have methodically dismantled Russian logistics across the southern theater from the Donbas approaches all the way to Crimea. Drone strikes on fuel convoys, ammunition trucks, rail hubs and bridges have created chronic shortages of fuel, water, ammunition and food for Russian troops.
Reports from occupied Crimea and the southern land corridor document rationing, long lines at gas stations and mounting chaos. Ukrainian strikes have effectively placed large portions of the Russian southern front under a logistics lockdown.
With supply lines under constant interdiction, half or more of Russia’s southern grouping now operates under severe strain — a situation that risks localized collapse if the pressure continues. This, while Russian territorial gains have slowed to a crawl — and even reversed.
Strategically, Ukraine has accomplished something extraordinary. Its sustained campaign of long-range drone and missile strikes against Russian oil refineries and energy infrastructure intensified dramatically in the last month. Kyiv has inflicted damage on Russia’s fuel production capacity that took the U.S. Army Air Forces two full years of strategic bombing to achieve against Nazi Germany in World War II.
Major refineries from Moscow to the south have been hit repeatedly. Processing capacity has been slashed by more than a third. Russia now faces a genuine fuel crisis: lines at pumps, regional shortages and emergency measures. Putin himself has acknowledged the "difficult period."
The cruel arithmetic is now unavoidable. Who gets the remaining fuel? Front-line troops? The Russian military’s broader needs? Civilian motorists? Trucks and trains hauling food and goods? Farmers trying to bring in the harvest? A food crisis looms as transport and agriculture feel the squeeze.
Ukraine has gone further. Long-range strikes have also targeted Russian military electronics plants and missile production facilities. In June, Ukrainian forces hit a key electronics plant in Voronezh that produces components for Iskander missiles and other systems. When new Russian missiles emerge from damaged factories, they will fly with inferior avionics. Accuracy will suffer. The terror weapons aimed at Ukrainian apartments and hospitals may soon struggle to even hit a city center.
Ukrainian drones have not stopped at Russia’s borders. Naval and aerial drones have ranged far into the Black Sea and beyond, striking Russia’s shadow fleet of tankers used to evade sanctions and fund the war. Attacks have occurred off Turkey’s coast and even in the Mediterranean — vessels hit hundreds or thousands of miles from Ukrainian territory. This campaign degrades Moscow’s ability to export oil and generate war revenue.
All of this flows from Ukraine’s rapid mastery of drone technology and its decentralized, innovative military culture. Ukrainian industry has scaled production of AI-enhanced drones and cruise missiles at a pace that Russia’s legacy, Soviet-style, rigid, top-down systems cannot match.
There is a painful lesson here for the United States.
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Much of our Navy — aircraft carriers and submarines alike — remains vulnerable to massed drone attacks, both by air and sea, when at port. Air bases, power grids and other critical infrastructure also sit exposed. Adversaries could launch similar drone swarms from Cuba or Mexico, or from Chinese merchant vessels loitering off our coasts. We have seen what cheap, massed drones, some with warheads larger than a ton, can do when employed with imagination and industrial scale.
America must absorb these lessons quickly. President Donald Trump’s Department of War has called for urgent investment in layered counter-drone and missile defenses — the Golden Dome initiative — as well as hardened infrastructure and our own rapid innovation in unmanned systems. It’s up to Congress to fund it. We must reward decentralized initiative and speed rather than bureaucratic caution. The alternative is to learn these truths the hard way.
Russia’s terror campaign has failed to break Ukraine, while Ukraine’s precision campaign is systematically degrading Russia’s ability to wage war. Fortunately, war’s harsh lessons are plainly displayed for America to see — as we strive to deter adversaries.
Tyler Robinson hearing: Top moments from explosive Lance Twiggs interview played in court
PROVO, Utah — The former lover of Charlie Kirk’s accused assassin told Utah prosecutors that the suspected killer "wishes he hadn't done it," according to a video played in court Thursday.
"I just asked him in person if what he said was true the night before, and he said it was, started crying a little bit and said he wishes he hadn't done it," Lance Twiggs told investigators in a video interview.
The night before, according to text messages prosecutors displayed later, Robinson allegedly took credit for Kirk's shooting in a conversation with Twiggs.
TYLER ROBINSON PRELIMINARY HEARING: JUDGE ORDERS REDACTIONS TO EX-LOVER’S VIDEO TESTIMONY
The video was played on the fourth day of Tyler Robinson’s preliminary hearing — a procedural step to determine whether the case can go to trial.
Prosecutors had attempted to play it Wednesday, but the defense asked the judge to order redactions.
After some back and forth over what could and couldn’t be included, it was shown in court Thursday morning, and Robinson appeared to watch it closely.
Twiggs, who is cooperating with investigators and hasn’t been charged with a crime, was also Robinson's lover and roommate, according to prosecutors. He said that he identified as "Luna" to some associates, including Robinson.
Twiggs was briefly placed under FBI protection and has since left the state.
After the shooting, Twiggs allegedly received a text message from Robinson telling him to look under his keyboard. There, according to prosecutors, he found a note that he said he took a picture of.
CHARLIE KIRK ASSASSINATION: TIMELINE OF UTAH CAMPUS SHOOTING, TYLER ROBINSON CHARGED
Prosecutors showed it in court, but the judge said it could not be photographed. It was a full page, written by hand.
"I had the opportunity to take out Charlie Kirk and I’m going to take it," it read at one point.
After seeing the note, Twiggs then allegedly texted Robinson asking if he was joking.
CHARLIE KIRK'S FAMILY COMES FACE TO FACE WITH ACCUSED ASSASSIN FOR FIRST TIME
"I am still ok my love, but am stuck in orem for a little while longer yet," Robinson replied — allegedly. "Shouldn’t be long until I can come home, but I gotta grab my rifle still. To be honest I had hoped to keep this secret till I died of old age. I am sorry to involve you."
"You weren’t the one who did it right????" Twiggs replied.
"I am," Robinson allegedly wrote back. "I’m sorry."
Twiggs also alleged in the video that Robinson began engraving bullets roughly a month before the shooting.
"I don't remember exactly when, but he had said he was planning to go hunting with his family," Twiggs told prosecutor Ryan McBride in the recorded interview. "And he asked me...if we had a Dremel tool, because he said he wanted to create messages on bullets."
Prosecutors have said that cartridges and a spent casing recovered from the suspected murder weapon had been engraved with several messages. Another casing with a similar engraving had been recovered from the home Robinson and Twiggs shared, according to testimony Thursday.
Several times when the Dremel tool allegedly used to engrave the bullets came up Robinson appeared uncomfortable in the courtroom, fidgeting in his chair.
Twiggs said he told Robinson where to find the tool and warned him not to accidentally discharge a bullet while engraving — then didn’t think of it again until after Kirk was killed.
CHARLIE KIRK'S PARENTS, WIDOW TO ATTEND TYLER ROBINSON'S PRELIMINARY HEARING NEXT WEEK
Mention of the tool also appeared to have an impact on Robinson's family in the first row of the gallery in court.
As the Dremel discussion continued, Robinson’s brother was bent over with his head down, with his mother rubbing his back, and the father's arm around her.
Later in the hearing, when the court saw a text message conversation between Robinson and Twiggs, Erika Kirk could be heard crying as the texts were read in court of Twiggs asking Robinson questions about the gun, which by the time they were sent had been recovered by police in a wooded area just off campus.
According to Twiggs' video interview, Robinson allegedly told him that he had a "long drive to work" on the morning of the shooting.
"I don't know an exact time," he said. "I just know he left early. I heard him leaving, and he just said he had, like, long drive to work that day. So he was leaving early."
That was on Sept. 10, the day of Kirk's assassination at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. Robinson allegedly lingered in the area until after midnight on Sept. 11.
When Twiggs said he woke up at around noon to 1 p.m. on the day of the shooting, members of Kirk's family scoffed from the third row of the gallery.
Robinson reached up and scratched his throat when Twiggs talked about the last time he saw Tyler before he went to surrender.
In another portion of the video interview, Twiggs told investigators that Robinson looked like the man circulated on an FBI wanted poster connected to the shooting, which showed a person of interest on campus.
"They do look like Tyler Robinson," Twiggs said.
He had downplayed the identification, however.
"I wouldn't say with 100% certainty just because of camera quality, but that looks like him in terms of the shoes he's wearing, the sunglasses," Twiggs said. "I don't think I'd specifically seen him wearing that hat, but he was usually wearing a hat, and the jeans."
Twiggs did not testify in person at the preliminary hearing but may be asked to do so if the case goes to trial.
Near the end of Thursday's hearing, Judge Tony Graf Jr. indicated that he would not make a decision at the end of the preliminary hearing this week. Instead, he agreed to a defense request to allow briefs to be filed by both sides before he listens to oral arguments at a hearing scheduled for Sept. 1.
Only after that would he make a decision on where there's enough probable cause to send Robinson's case to trial.
The 23-year-old accused assassin has not yet entered a plea and won’t do so unless the judge agrees with prosecutors that the charges are warranted.
The September hearing will be nearly a year after a sniper's bullet killed Kirk during a Turning Point USA event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah.
Robinson could face the death penalty if convicted.
Caitlin Clark haters got some additional ammo as Fever win again without their star guard
PHOENIX – The Caitlin Clark haters got some additional ammunition on Thursday night as the Fever defeated the Phoenix Mercury 92-89 to move to 4-0 without Clark this season.
Kelsey Mitchell scored 29 points, including a go-ahead layup with 10 seconds left, to lead all scorers. Aliyah Boston returned from injury and scored 21 points. Rookie Raven Johnson saw extended minutes with Clark sidelined but only managed to score 6 points in the star's absence.
Sophie Cunningham, who produced perhaps the most viral moment of the WNBA season when the Mercury and Fever met on June 22, hit two clutch free throws in the final seconds to seal the win.
FEVER COACH STEPHANIE WHITE DODGES QUESTION ON GOP LETTER ABOUT CAITLIN CLARK’S TREATMENT IN WNBA
Alyssa Thomas, who was suspended for one game for a Flagrant 2 foul on Clark when the two teams met on June 24, scored 22 points in the loss.
The Fever ruled Clark out for Thursday night's game against Phoenix despite the guard playing 16 minutes on Wednesday against the Los Angeles Sparks and saying afterward that her "body feels great."
Stephanie White said prior to Wednesday's game that Clark and Boston would split the back-to-back, with Clark active against Los Angeles and Boston active against Phoenix.
Indiana is 9-9 in games Clark has played this season, but is now 4-0 without her. However, there's important context. Only one of the teams the Fever have defeated without Clark has a winning record, the Las Vegas Aces.
That might sound impressive, given that the Aces are the defending WNBA champions. However, four-time MVP A'ja Wilson missed the game with an injury.
The other wins came against the expansion Portland Fire on May 20, the currently 9-11 Los Angeles Sparks on June 27 and the now 8-15 Mercury on Thursday.
While many Clark haters on social media like to say that she is a liability defensively (even though the data suggests that's not entirely true), the team didn't exactly put on a defensive clinic without her. Especially in the first half.
CANDACE PARKER TELLS CAITLIN CLARK HATERS TO 'GO TO THERAPY' AFTER SHOCKING WNBA PLAYER RANKINGS
The Mercury scored 53 points across the first two quarters, shooting 55% from the field.
Regardless, there's a certain section of people out there who root for Clark to fail. A fourth straight win in games that she has missed is certain to provide them with additional fuel.
Logan Webb deletes X account after lashing out at reporter, Giants fans following embarrassing loss
The San Francisco Giants' season-long struggles are weighing heavily on Logan Webb, and the frustration spilled onto the internet for everyone to see.
On Wednesday, following a blowout loss to the Blue Jays at Oracle Park, the All-Star pitcher started trading shots with critics on X before eventually deleting his account.
The back-and-forth began after KNBR's Jack Loder posted a video criticizing the Giants' "leadership void" and questioned whether Webb had consistently lived up to his billing as the team's ace.
SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS ASKED TO RETIRE 'THRUSTING' CELEBRATION A DAY AFTER TAKING THE LEAGUE BY STORM
"When someone is supposed to be your ace, you think that they're going to give you the best chance to win every week," Loder posted. "Logan Webb had an awesome June, he was bad in April, he missed most of May. I've said over the years that he's been a great Giant, like I've really appreciated his Giants tenure. But there's always been a little bit lacking."
Webb lost control, going after Loder, posting: "You know what's sad is they allow people like you in the locker room."
When KNBR host Adam Copeland chimed into the thread, Webb shut him down with a quick side swipe:
"Who are you?"
When one user called his public replies embarrassing, Webb snapped, "Do you get paid by KNBR?"
NATIONALS PITCHER FORCED TO APOLOGIZE FOR PERCEIVED RACISM AFTER OPPONENT THREW HIS HELMET AT HIM
To another critical account, he fired off: "Honestly you probably don't know anything about anything some loser on the couch that couldn't make his little league team."
Whether Webb returns to X or not, he'll have plenty of explaining to do.
The social media back-and-forth followed a miserable night on the mound.
Webb surrendered five first-inning runs, including a grand slam to Kazuma Okamoto. He settled in to finish seven innings, but the bullpen unraveled, and the Giants' offense was nearly no-hit by Dylan Cease in a 10-0 shutout.
First-year manager Tony Vitello, fresh off a successful run at Tennessee, is navigating a difficult first season, and his intense college coaching style has come under increasing scrutiny as the losses have piled up.
Webb is heading to the All-Star Game next week.
But instead of fielding questions about his season, he'll likely be answering for his social media meltdown.
Send us your thoughts: alejandro.avila@outkick.com / Follow along on X: @alejandroaveela
Fever coach Stephanie White dodges question on GOP letter about Caitlin Clark’s treatment in WNBA
PHOENIX – Indiana Fever head coach Stephanie White showed little interest in addressing a recent letter sent by 11 Republican members of Congress to WNBA Commissioner Cathy Engelbert over the treatment of superstar Caitlin Clark.
OutKick asked White prior to Thursday night's game against the Phoenix Mercury what her reaction was to the letter, which stated that the Republican lawmakers were concerned about "physical hostility" and "violence" that Clark faces and suggested it might be "racially motivated."
"Our team made a statement yesterday so you can find that statement," White said.
"I understand that, I just mean as a coach when you hear that one of your players is being mentioned in a letter from members of Congress to the commissioner of the league, how do you handle that?" I pressed.
"Again, that's not something we can control," White said, sidestepping the question a second time before echoing some of the language from the team's statement.
"We're not affiliated with those groups. We try to keep the main thing the main thing and focus on the things we can control."
The Fever released a statement on Wednesday that said, "Our organization nor Caitlin has had any interaction with anyone in this congressional group and we were unaware of their letter."
The statement continued: "We have been clear in our public comments and in our ongoing dialogue with the League about the priority of player safety. Our players and our fans know where we stand on those issues, and we will continue to stick up for our team and a standard of excellence across the league."
In other words, the Fever and White are willing to broadly discuss "player safety" but neither directly addressed whether race has anything to do with how Clark specifically is treated.
Of course, Clark is the league's biggest star by a wide margin and it behooves everyone involved to protect her at all costs. However, it seems that many of the players in the WNBA might not have gotten that memo.
As the letter states, "Clark has been hip-checked, poked in the eye, and struck in the throat during games. These incidents go far beyond routine physical play, yet the WNBA and its officiating have too often failed to address these unacceptable incidents and hold players accountable."
CANDACE PARKER TELLS CAITLIN CLARK HATERS TO 'GO TO THERAPY' AFTER SHOCKING WNBA PLAYER RANKINGS
The Fever ruled Clark out for Thursday night's game against Phoenix despite the guard playing 16 minutes on Wednesday against the Los Angeles Sparks and saying afterward that her "body feels great."
White did not address whether the decision to sit Clark had anything to do with Thursday's opponent, the Mercury. She did say prior to Wednesday's game that Clark and Aliyah Boston would split the back-to-back, with Clark active against Los Angeles and Boston active against Phoenix.
The last time the Fever and Mercury met, on June 24, Phoenix forward Alyssa Thomas drove her fist into Clark's throat area during a scramble for a loose ball.
No foul was called on the play in real time, but the WNBA announced the following day that Thomas had received a Flagrant Foul 2 penalty and a one-game suspension after a postgame review.
Many fans were eagerly anticipating a rematch between the two teams, since their June 22 meeting also spawned the now famous Sophie Cunningham pointing meme.
While Cunningham took the court on Thursday night in Phoenix, Clark did not.
Maybe the Fever are taking player safety seriously after all and not subjecting her to the team that, according to White, delivered "two cheap shots" to Clark.
Of course, it would be better if teams stopped taking cheap shots at Clark altogether. Baby steps, though.
Florida man who contacted police about 1987 killing arrested in connection to cold case
A Florida man who contacted authorities saying he had information about a 1987 killing was instead arrested and facing a murder charge, investigators said Thursday.
The Jacksonville Sheriff's Office announced that Gary Edward Glowacz, 70, was arrested Wednesday in connection with the killing of 20-year-old Melissa Ellison.
Police said Glowacz contacted the sheriff's office Wednesday and told investigators he wanted to provide information about Ellison's death.
Detectives interviewed Glowacz before obtaining an arrest warrant.
He was booked into the Duval County Jail on charges of murder and burglary with battery.
Officials celebrated the arrest, which comes nearly four decades after the case went cold.
NORTH CAROLINA COLD CASE HEATS UP WITH STEPMOTHER ACCUSED OF KILLING MISSING TEEN
"Television shows condition us to believe that homicide cases that are not solved within the first 48 hours will not be solved," Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters said during a news conference. "That is patently false."
"While his arrest cannot fill the enormous void left in the hearts of Melissa Ellison's loved ones, I hope that this arrest is another step in the healing process," he added.
Police responded to a home on Colejean Road at about 4:40 a.m. on Dec. 28, 1987, after receiving a report of a deceased person.
Ellison's body was found by authorities in her bed with injuries consistent with blunt force trauma, according to police.
Investigators said Ellison's roommates checked on her after hearing her toddler crying on the living room couch.
The sheriff's office thanked First Coast Crime Stoppers, the State Attorney's Office, Project Cold Case and the Clay County Sheriff's Office for their work on the investigation.
Donald Trump Jr argues Charlie Kirk murder evidence puts conspiracy theories 'at rest'
Donald Trump Jr. said Thursday that unsealed evidence from the preliminary hearing in Charlie Kirk’s murder case puts to rest "conspiracy theories" surrounding his death.
Trump Jr., a longtime friend of Kirk, was in the courtroom in Provo, Utah, this week, hearing arguments and viewing unsealed evidence against Kirk’s accused killer, Tyler Robinson.
"Based on everything that I saw in that courtroom, it's very clear to me that Tyler Robinson did this," he said on "Jesse Watters Primetime."
Robinson, 23, is accused of fatally shooting Kirk, 31, at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10, 2025, and could face the death penalty if convicted.
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His preliminary hearing began Monday, with prosecutors attempting to establish probable cause to allow the case to proceed to trial on a series of charges.
Robinson allegedly admitted to killing Kirk in unsealed text messages to his roommate after the shooting, saying he "had enough of his hatred," according to testimony from Thursday’s hearing.
"This stuff is very cut-and-dry at this point," Trump Jr. said.
"The DNA evidence, the fact that… he turned himself in… to me, it puts so much of this at rest," he added.
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Trump Jr., a regular speaker at Turning Point USA events, questioned the lack of security presence at Kirk’s Utah Valley University event.
"The biggest question in my mind at this point is not whether Tyler Robinson did this, or if it was some people from a foreign land, or another planet — it was, why were there only six police officers active at a major event on a university campus?" he asked.
Trump Jr. added that TPUSA college campus events usually draw a heavier law enforcement presence, noting they attract "thousands" of people.
"These are big events," he said. "I've done 100 of them with Charlie Kirk on college campuses all over the place... That there wasn't an all-hands-on-deck kind of operation to prevent this very thing from happening is truly scary."
Trump Jr. argued that questions surrounding Kirk’s death had once been a "50–50" issue, but said the unsealed evidence has shifted public sentiment to "90–10," adding that most believe Robinson is guilty.
He dismissed "conspiracy theories" surrounding Kirk’s death while saying he understands why people could be skeptical.
Prosecutors are expected to present more evidence during Friday’s hearing. A trial date has not been set.