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Canadian powerlifting champion April Hutchinson leads first Sophie Cunningham rally outside the US
Canadian powerlifting champion April Hutchinson led the seventh Sophie Cunningham rally on Tuesday night in Toronto – the first to take place outside of the U.S.
A crowd of Cunningham supporters gathered outside of Scotiabank Arena ahead of the Indiana Fever's win against the Toronto Tempo. Supporters were seen wearing XX-XY Athletics T-shirts.
Hutchinson told Fox News Digital it was all Cunningham supporters, until a small crowd of around five people wearing pro-transgender messaging exchanged words with the Cunningham crowd.
"Only about five were wearing protect trans kids and protect the dolls t shirts, [they] walked by and said that our signs were disrespectful," Hutchinson said.
Hutchinson also credited Toronto police for helping ensure the safety of the rallygoers.
"The Toronto police contacted me this morning and wanted details about the rally to ensure our safety," Hutchinson said.
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However, a disagreement between Cunningham supporters and local police broke out. A large mobile billboard that featured Cunningham and messaging by Martina Navratilova addressing fairness in women's sports, and other athletes, prompted police to issue tickets.
RILEY GAINES SAYS TARGET CENTER STAFFER TRIED TO SHUT DOWN HER SOPHIE CUNNINGHAM SIGN
The billboard was set up by the news outlet Rebel News. Rebel News has told Fox News Digital they have contacted a lawyer to fight the charges.
A copy of the ticket obtained by Fox News Digital showed the charges listed as "Display sign with animation/video display/illumination/flashing lights/sound/movement or simulation motion, contrary to Toronto Municipal By-law 693-14, Section 12."
The Toronto Police Department responded to Fox News Digital's request for comment, writing, "Since this charge is now before the courts, we won’t be able to provide any further information."
Inside the arena, Cunningham had a solid shooting night, hitting three of three shots from three-point range, finishing with 13 total points. However, many fans in the arena booed Cunningham, as she has become a polarizing figure since coming out in support of protecting women's sports from biological males.
WNBA FAN SUBREDDIT BANS POSTERS FROM USING SOPHIE CUNNINGHAM'S NAME AFTER DEFENSE OF WOMEN'S SPORTS
Cunningham addressed the boos after the game, and praised the Toronto crowd.
"I want to shout out the Tempo crowd, and the city, I think we had so much fun, it's my first time being in Canada... but the crowd was absolutely amazing, and I think that's what sports is all about, you're going to get boos you're going to get cheers, but just the fact that they're so passionate, they're loud and they're putting out for the city, I think it's amazing," Cunningham told reporters.
The Cunningham rallies will follow the Fever to their next two games, as two more "Sophie Nights" are planned to take place outside Indiana's next game in Dallas against the Wings, and in New York on Saturday ahead of a matchup against the Liberty.
King Charles accused of 'deserting Christians' as experts warn Prince William may abandon historic royal role
King Charles III was criticized by Queen Elizabeth’s former chaplain, Gavin Ashenden, recently, who claimed the monarch is "deserting Christians" and abandoned his oath as "Defender of the Faith."
This came after "Defender of the Faith" was replaced in this year’s Sovereign Grant Annual Report in June with "His Majesty is Supreme Governor of the Church of England and protects the space for Faith within the multi-faith nation."
Royal expert Richard Fitzwilliams told Fox News Digital the "new wording" has "caused considerable controversy."
PRINCE HARRY'S 'THE WASP' RIVAL STEPPING DOWN BUT MAY REMAIN A 'VOICE IN THE KING'S EAR': EXPERT
He added that it would have been better to leave "‘Defender of the Faith’ in the text after ‘Supreme Governor of the Church of England’ and then add a phrase that recognised Britain as multi-faith which should be included. Whoever wrote ‘protects the space for Faith within the multi-faith nation’ is no credit to the English language as this phrase is both weak and woke."
Christopher Andersen, author of the new biography "Kate!" noted that Charles has always had a "powerful ecumenical streak."
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"As far back as his student days at Cambridge, Charles in the 1970s was showing a strong interest in what eastern religions had to offer, particularly Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism," he said.
And while Elizabeth was "very respectful" of other religions' customs, "she never wavered when it came to her Christian beliefs," he said.
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Andersen explained, "Charles is just a different sort of animal. The current king has long believed that no one religion has all the answers. He also knows that if he is going to have a big-tent reign, then he can't leave non-Christians standing out in the cold — he's going to have to let Muslims and Hindus and Jews and Buddhists inside."
And it’s not just Charles, he noted.
"The new generation of royals isn't quite so sure about how to react to the whole ‘Defender of the Faith’ thing," Andersen said. "A particularly telling moment came when William enrolled at Eton College in 1995."
With cameras rolling, William sat at a desk filling out enrollment papers.
"When it came time to fill out the space marked ‘Religion,’ the future Head of the Church of England looked up at his father quizzically and asked what he should put down," Andersen emphasized. "If that is any indication, it is obvious that once they are king and queen, William and Kate will in all likelihood move to phase out the Defender of the Faith role altogether."
Royal broadcaster Ian Pelham Turner called Charles a "deep thinker when it comes to religion, adding that "William is not interested in the church whilst Catherine has been a staunch Christian especially renewing her beliefs more recently during her cancer diagnosis."
Fitzwilliams, however, stressed that the Church of England shouldn’t be weakened any further.
"Queen Elizabeth memorably compared the Church of England to an umbrella under which other faiths could flourish," he said. "She was a believer. The Church of England is clearly extremely weak. It is emphatically not in the royal family's interest, especially as we are the only monarchy in Europe to have a Coronation, to weaken it further."
Tupac murder trial faces ‘snitches get stitches’ problem but defendant's ghostwriter could be key
Tupac Shakur's murder trial could come down to the words of his accused killer and a ghostwriter involved in the book that helped authorities bring charges in the decades-old cold case, according to a retired LAPD detective.
Although the mantra of "snitches get stitches" hangs over the case, defendant Duane "Keffe D" Davis outlined his alleged involvement in a series of interviews with law enforcement — in part while working as a confidential informant — in a TV interview and again in his own memoir.
While the defense has hinted that Davis' ghostwriter Yusef Jah fictionalized some details and that the defendant wasn't involved in the crime, prosecutors have Jah's name on their witness list.
"I suspect that the prosecution is going to have to call the writer of this book and ask him point blank and directly: Did you write this based on what Davis told you?" said Moses Castillo, a retired LAPD detective. "And then if he says yes, and this is what he told me, then it's gonna be very hard to dispute that fact."
Still, he told Fox News Digital, prosecutors have a tough case because Shakur's murder happened nearly 30 years ago and few witnesses cooperated at the time.
Even survivor Marion "Suge" Knight, a co-founder of Death Row Records who was in the car with Shakur and wounded in the shooting, has said he does not want to testify if called to the stand. Like Jah, he's also on the witness list.
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"When you're in this circle of gangs and gang involvement, you don't want to be a snitch," Castillo added. "You don't wanna be that person that's being classified as a rat. Because as they say: snitches get stitches, and that is really true."
But as Clark County Chief Deputy District Attorney Binu Palal said in his opening statement Monday, one person did talk. That was Davis, who sat for interviews with investigators in 1998, 1999, 2008 and 2009, in addition to sitting for a BET documentary and discussing details in his book.
Prosecutors played some of his statements from 2008 in court on Monday — including his account of obtaining the gun and his claim that his nephew, who has since died, fired the shots.
Defense attorney Michael Sanft countered that it's up to jurors to decide what the facts are, based on evidence shown in court.
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"What they are telling you, they're representing it to be a fact when it really is fiction. And it's up to you to determine what the facts are in this case," he said in his own opening.
Sanft said investigators never vetted the claims in Davis' book, not even interviewing other witnesses allegedly in the suspect vehicle before they died.
A gunman in a white Cadillac opened fire on a BMW carrying Shakur and Knight on Sept. 7, 1996, on the Las Vegas Strip. Knight recovered from minor injuries. Shakur succumbed to his injuries six days later at 25 years old.
New ‘Reagan’ movie museum planned for president’s hometown
FIRST ON FOX — Young America’s Foundation is partnering with the "Reagan" movie to showcase some of the sets and props from the biopic.
The materials from the movie about President Ronald Reagan’s life will become permanent exhibits at the new museum in Dixon, Ill., complementing YAF’s stewardship of Reagan’s Boyhood Home in Dixon and the historic Reagan Ranch, also known as "Rancho del Cielo," in Santa Barbara, California. The collection includes a full-scale replica of the Oval Office, the Situation Room, the office of the Soviet leader, the wall of the Hilton Hotel where Reagan was shot, along with hundreds of artifacts from the film. It is expected to open in 2028.
YAF President and former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said it’s been meaningful to bring students and families to Dixon over the years to learn about President Reagan, and said the movie museum will help guests discover even more about the beloved actor-turned-president.
NEW DIRECTOR'S CUT OF 2024 ‘REAGAN’ BIOPIC WILL RETURN TO THEATERS FOR AMERICA’S 250TH ANNIVERSARY
"There’s a great series of stories about what he learned in the Midwest and how that impacted the rest of his public life," Walker told Fox News Digital. "And our hope now is with the connection with the ‘Reagan’ movie, we helped them film a number of the things, particularly at the ranch, created this bond, and then after the movie was done, I thought how cool would it be to connect [with] things like the Oval Office, and have students and families and other guests come in and have a chance not only to take a picture and see what it was like, but then ask questions about, ‘What did he learn here in the Midwest, what impact, what influences, what books, what life experiences shaped not just him becoming President of the United States, but one of the greatest leaders of the 20th century in the entire world?"
"Bringing down communism, bringing patriotism back to America, and revitalizing our economy," Walker added of Reagan. "So those will be a part of, taking not just the sets, but then tying them in with virtual and photographic and video images of President Reagan so that young people in the end will feel a connection to Ronald Reagan, but more importantly to his ideas."
"Young America’s Foundation has done extraordinary work preserving Ronald Reagan’s physical legacy," "Reagan" producer Mark Joseph said in a press release. "By bringing these artifacts from our film to them, we are ensuring that visitors to Dixon can experience the story of Reagan’s humble beginnings. We hope this museum will be a place where fans of the movie can gather and enjoy the sets that our team worked so hard to build."
When Dixon hosted its own premiere of "Reagan" in 2024, it seemed like nearly the entire town had turned out to celebrate. It didn’t hurt that lead actor Dennis Quaid had showed up, too. In an interview with Fox Digital before the premiere, Quaid said he was happy to brush shoulders with the locals because Hollywood "forgot" about small towns.
Walker expects the turnout for the museum will also be "huge."
"You saw how the hometown came out in force," Walker said of the movie premiere. "And I love how Dennis Quaid could have just done the Hollywood premiere, but he was so connected to Ronald Reagan in that movie, he personally said he wanted to come and join us in Dixon – not only to do the tour of the boyhood home, but then to come over and do an interview in front of the crowd before the movie premiered.
"I just think it’s a tremendous story, not only for Dixon and that county and that area, but I think it’s an American story."
Walker said he "loves" telling students about Reagan’s humble upbringing. His parents, he said, rented their first home and each of their homes got progressively smaller because his dad was an alcoholic and kept losing his job, so his mom would have to take on odd jobs to help them stay afloat.
Yet, she still made time for some philanthropy, staying involved in church, and a ministry to reach out to inmates in the local jail. She later attended a community college and worked the night shift on the radio.
SCOTT WALKER WARNS HONG 'UNDERMINING ONE OF HER STRENGTHS' WITH CAMPAIGN BACKTRACKING
Walker said Reagan kept that humility throughout his career.
"It’s a great reminder to kids, you don’t have to grow up with privilege or money, or go to a certain school. Anyone can live the American Dream, whether it’s in politics, in business, in education, and life in general," he said.
The museum announcement comes as filmmakers prepare the release of the director’s cut of "Reagan," featuring 10 additional minutes, which will be released nationwide on September 25. Walker reflected on the glaring disparity between movie critics and audiences upon the original film’s release. While the movie only had a Rotten Tomatoes critics score of 18% in the weeks following its release, it boasted a 98% audience score.
Walker chalked the disparity up to "snotty elitists" among the critics.
"I love that because when Ronald Reagan was president, the political critics hated him," Walker said. "They overwhelmingly said, ‘This guy is an actor, he doesn’t know anything, he’s going to get nothing done, he’s going to start World War III, he’s awful.’ And what happened? Forty-nine of 50 states went for him."
Socialists capture major Florida victory on hit-or-miss night for Trump-endorsed primary candidates
Tuesday night's primary elections featured closely watched federal races from sunny South Florida to the frigid Alaskan tundra and two states in between, all of which will help decide whether Republicans maintain control of Congress, or whether Democrats overtake them.
Three states also featured critical gubernatorial primary elections.
Observers are already using the race results as bellwethers to gauge Trump's grip over the GOP and the power of the emergent socialist movement.
Here's what stood out:
A Sunshine State socialist scores a shocking Senate upset despite being heavily outspent.
A socialist will have a chance to unseat a sitting Republican senator after upsetting a heavily favored opponent who outspent her nine-to-one.
Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) member and Democratic state Rep. Angie Nixon scored a massive upset in the state's Democratic primary for U.S. Senate. Nixon ran against retired Air Force Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, a prominent critic of Trump who played a central role in the left's failed 2019 impeachment attempt, who was expected to emerge victorious.
She defeated Vindman by almost 12 points, despite his $16.3 million war chest, compared to hers of only about $1 million. As of July, Vindman had spent about $9 million on the race, while Nixon had spent just over $700,000.
TRUMP'S HANDPICKED DESANTIS SUCCESSOR WINS CROWDED GOP PRIMARY FOR FLORIDA GOVERNOR
Nixon will square off in a statewide race against Sen. Ashley Moody, R-Fla.
Trump has a hit-or-miss endorsement night
Across the country, some of Trump's endorsed candidates won their respective races, while others struggled.
Trump-endorsed Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., won the Sunshine State's Republican gubernatorial primary against a field that included Lt. Gov. Jay Collins and outsider James Fishback. Donalds won 47%, compared with 25% for Collins and 10.5% for Fishback.
Donalds will face former Florida Republican congressman-turned-Democrat David Jolly, who won the nod for the job on the Democratic side.
TRUMP FLEXES GOP MUSCLE IN ARIZONA PRIMARIES AS DEMS DODGE FAR-LEFT UPSET
Likewise, Republican Sen. Ashley Moody, herself a Trump endorsee, took home a victory in a special Senate primary election to finish the remainder of Secretary of State Marco Rubio's U.S. Senate term, which ends in 2028. Moody was appointed to the seat last year after Rubio joined the Trump administration.
Republican Rep. Randy Fine of Florida's 6th Congressional District, also endorsed by Trump, easily won his reelection bid.
However, it wasn't all smiles for Team Trump.
Scandal-plagued incumbent Rep. Cory Mills, R-Fla., who represents the state's 7th Congressional District, lost his race to challenger and former TV anchor Ryan Elijah.
Trump endorsed Mills in February, but the congressman is facing a wide-ranging House Ethics Committee investigation into possible campaign finance violations, allegations of assault against a romantic partner and allegations of improperly received or solicited gifts. Mills has denied wrongdoing.
The 7th District leans red, meaning Elijah should have an edge come November.
Meanwhile, Catalina Lauf, who scored an 11th-hour endorsement from Trump last week, lost her bid to fill Donalds' seat in Florida's 19th Congressional District in a race that featured several unusual political twists.
Media executive Jim Schwartzel won the five-way race with 29.1% of the vote, while Lauf earned 22%. Businessman Jim Oberweis placed third with 15.7% of the vote.
Lauf and Oberweis are familiar rivals, having squared off in a crowded midwestern Republican primary years ago. Both ran in Illinois' 14th Congressional District back in 2020. Oberweis won that round, but lost to a Democrat in the general election.
Two years later, Lauf ran unsuccessfully in Illinois' 11th Congressional District, though that race did not feature Oberweis.
The fourth-place finisher in Tuesday night's 19th Congressional District race in Florida was former Rep. Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina, who was defeated in 2022 amid scandal and after attempting to change districts.
Schwartzel is all but certain to win his November general election in the deep red district.
AMERICA’S REDDEST STATE CROWNS GOP GOVERNOR NOMINEE
A similar story played out in the western U.S.
In Wyoming's U.S. Senate primary, Trump-endorsed Rep. Harriet Hageman, who serves as the state's at-large congresswoman, won in a landslide. She defeated cattle rancher Sam Mead. With 80% of the votes counted, Hageman held a 62% to 28% lead over Mead, with three others lagging well behind.
However, in Wyoming's gubernatorial primary, Republican voters spurned Trump's choice, electing state Sen. Eric Barlow over Megan Degenfelder, the state's superintendent of public instruction. Barlow, too, won decidedly, holding a lead of 50% to Degenfelder's 29.7% with three quarters of the votes counted.
Both races were called shortly after polls closed.
Wyoming's Secretary of State Chuck Gray won a competitive five-way primary, garnering 25% of the vote. Businessman Steve Freiss earned 20.7% of the vote. Army veteran Kevin Christensen won 17.8% of the vote.
The state hasn't elected a Democrat in a statewide race since 2006, and that trend is likely to continue in November.
Incumbent Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan finished second in the state's non-partisan primaries, and will move on to the general election where he will face three other candidates, including former Democratic congresswoman Mary Peltola, the top vote-getter, in November.
Trump buried the losses in a post on TRUTH Social.
"A lot of great WINS tonight!!!" he said.
VETERAN DEM DEFEATS SCANDAL-PLAGUED FORMER LAWMAKER, PROGRESSIVE CHALLENGER IN TRUMP'S BACKYARD
On the House side, a familiar face won in the newly redrawn 20th Congressional District in Florida. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., was drawn out of the 25th District, which she currently represents.
Wasserman Schultz defeated four other candidates, including self-proclaimed socialist activist Elijah Manley, a serious contender who raised nearly $1 million in his bid. Despite the fundraising haul, Manley placed third behind former mayor of Broward County Dale Holness.
Manley argued on Monday night in an appearance on NBC News that it was inappropriate for Wasserman Schultz to run in the 20th District when she lives in what is now the 22nd District, and said Democrats "need fresh leaders" in Washington. He also argued that it was inappropriate for a White person to occupy the seat.
Race became a major issue in the contest, with Wasserman Schultz's detractors criticizing her decision to run in a district described as "historically Black."
"One of the last remaining opportunity districts that we have in the South being held by a white Democrat, that's unacceptable," Manley said in his Monday interview.
Former Democratic Rep. Sheri Cherfilus-McCormick placed fourth in the race. She represented the district until April when she resigned after facing federal criminal charges involving alleged misuse of disaster-relief funds. She has pleaded not guilty to those charges.
Wasserman Schultz should have a significant advantage in November in a district that heavily favors Democrats.
Elsewhere in the state, Rep. Jared Moskowitz crushed a surging socialist challenger in Florida's 25th Congressional District, defeating Oliver Larkin by a 64%-36% margin.
Moskowitz ran as a centrist Democrat, while Larkin proudly touted his membership in the DSA on the campaign trail.
Larkin said on the campaign trail that he wanted to abolish and prosecute members of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), taking his party's stance on ending the agency one step further. The former Bernie Sanders campaign field director also championed packing the Supreme Court, a $25 minimum wage, ending the Cuba embargo and D.C. statehood, along with statehood for Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa and the Northern Mariana Islands.
Moskowitz issued a fiery statement denouncing the DSA.
"Tonight, Democratic voters sent a clear message. I faced a challenge from the DSA. They threw everything at me and I didn’t change who I am or what I believe, and the voters overwhelmingly chose the independent-minded approach I’ve brought to Congress," he said. "I led the effort to have Kristi Noem fired, I've taken on this Administration, and I've taken on extremes in the DSA and won. Now we're running in a tough district hand-drawn by Republicans to defeat me, but I plan to win that too."
Moskowitz's district, once reliably blue, leans Republican after redistricting. He will face Republican former Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer.
One of the most closely watched Senate races in the country is ongoing in Alaska, as Republicans cling to a narrow majority in the upper chamber.
Alaska has non-partisan "top-four" primary elections, meaning that candidates from all parties compete in an open race, and the top four vote-getters advance to the general election. In the general election, the state uses ranked-choice voting.
Trump-endorsed Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan faced 15 primary challengers, including former Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola and a retired teacher.
The incumbent Sullivan was second in voting at the time the race was called, and will move on to the general election. Peltola, who lost her seat to Republican Rep. Nick Begich III in 2024, was in first and held a razor-thin lead of less than 1%.
Alaska's only member of the House, Begich, will be on the ballot in November as he battles to keep his seat. He will be joined by independent fisherman Bill Hill, while two additional spots in the four-candidate field remained uncalled early Wednesday.
The top two contenders in the gubernatorial race were separated by only two percentage points at the time AP called the race.
Politics runs in the Begich family, as Nick's uncle, Tom Begich, a Democrat and former state senator, secured a spot in the November general election alongside Democrat Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins.
As of early Wednesday morning, AP had not yet called the final two candidates advancing in each of Alaska’s Senate, House and gubernatorial races, all of which send four candidates to the November general election.
Iran war forces America to confront the strategic cost of deterring China
The most strategically revealing military move in the Iran war this week isn’t another strike on Tehran. It is an American aircraft carrier leaving the Pacific. The USS George Washington is heading toward the Middle East to relieve the USS Abraham Lincoln, whose overall deployment has exceeded 260 days, including more than 240 uninterrupted days at sea. The move could leave the Pacific without a U.S. carrier for an unknown period.
That does not mean China is preparing to attack Taiwan. It means the United States is making a real strategic tradeoff: a carrier reinforcing the Middle East cannot simultaneously deter in the Western Pacific. America has global reach, but its forces are not infinite, and geography still imposes choices.
The same point was visible in Adm. Brad Cooper’s just-completed 10-day trip through six Middle Eastern countries. CENTCOM says more than 50,000 American service members are now operating across the region. Iran is consuming ships, aircraft, munitions, logistics and command attention at the same time Washington says the Indo-Pacific must remain a priority.
That is the strategic dilemma. The question is no longer simply whether the United States has enough military power to continue operations against Iran. We do. The harder question is whether we are allocating that power in a way that matches our declared priorities.
The 2026 National Defense Strategy is unusually clear on this point. It calls for a strong denial defense along the First Island Chain and places deterring China among the Pentagon’s top priorities, expecting allies to shoulder more responsibility elsewhere. Whatever one thinks of that approach, it is strategy because it makes choices.
Now events are testing whether Washington is prepared to live by those choices.
This is not the familiar debate over whether America can "fight two wars." That phrase is too crude. The United States remains capable of fighting in more than one theater. The real problem is deterrence: Can we sustain a demanding conflict in the Middle East while keeping enough ready combat power elsewhere to persuade China that this is not its moment to attack Taiwan?
THREE KEY REASONS WHY AMERICA CANNOT AFFORD TO LOSE TAIWAN TO COMMUNIST CHINA
Deterrence does not require an adversary to believe we are invincible. It requires him to believe the cost of acting now is greater than the potential gain. Beijing does not need to conclude that America has become weak. Chinese planners need only ask whether American forces, munitions, maintenance capacity and political attention are tied down enough elsewhere to alter the risk of acting in the Pacific.
History offers useful warnings, not because 2026 replays 1941 or 1950, but because strategy has always meant matching ends, ways and means.
Britain learned that lesson painfully before Singapore fell on February 15, 1942. London carried military commitments across Europe, the Mediterranean, the Middle East and Asia while its naval resources were stretched by a global war. British defense planning for Singapore depended on reinforcing the Far East in a crisis, but when Japan struck, Britain was already fighting for survival elsewhere. The lesson wasn’t courage. It was strategic capacity: Britain had accumulated commitments it could no longer defend simultaneously.
The United States chose differently in World War II. Pearl Harbor made Japan the immediate enemy in the American mind, but Roosevelt and Churchill kept the main Allied effort focused on defeating Germany first. They reaffirmed that priority at Casablanca in 1943 while continuing the war against Japan. Strategy required distinguishing the most immediate enemy from the most consequential one.
The lesson isn’t that America needs a simplistic "China First" slogan; strategy cannot be reduced to a bumper sticker. It is that priorities have consequences. A nation cannot call one theater its principal military challenge and then assume repeated emergency commitments elsewhere carry no cost.
Our Navy makes that cost unusually visible. Airpower can shift between theaters quickly, though the tankers, bases, weapons and support that sustain it cannot. Naval power is less forgiving. A carrier committed to the Middle East is a carrier unavailable in the Pacific.
The Lincoln illustrates the point. Its deployment has stretched past 260 days at sea, and lawmakers have pressed the Pentagon for answers on the strain that extended combat cruise has placed on the ship and its roughly 5,000-person crew. The George Washington rotation is necessary. But necessary rotations still carry strategic tradeoffs.
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Nor can the Pentagon solve this quickly by ordering more ships. Congress and the administration should debate the size and composition of the future fleet, but a carrier ordered today will not arrive for years. Shipbuilding capacity, maintenance backlogs and munitions production are decades-long problems. Strategy operates with the force we have, not the force we wish we had.
That distinction matters as the Iran conflict stretches past six months. The larger strategic issue now reaches beyond Iran: What does each additional Middle Eastern commitment cost America’s ability to execute its wider defense strategy? That question only grows more urgent the longer the conflict lasts.
The answer need not be withdrawal. Nor does it require conceding the Middle East to Iran. It requires something Washington often resists: enforcing priorities. Which American interests are vital? Which can be handled primarily by allies? Which military capabilities must be protected for the highest-priority contingency? And what level of risk are we accepting elsewhere each time we surge into this crisis?
The Truman administration confronted a related problem when North Korea invaded the South in June 1950. Korea demanded immediate American combat power, but Washington faced the larger contest with the Soviet Union. NSC-68, issued two months earlier, had already called for a major military buildup to counter that threat. Korea accelerated it. Washington fought the immediate war without losing sight of the larger competition.
US DRAINS CRITICAL MISSILE STOCKPILES IN IRAN WAR AS YEARSLONG REBUILD LOOMS
That is the discipline required now.
The George Washington’s move toward the Mideast should focus attention in Congress and the White House, turning an abstract strategic debate into something visible on a map. One of America’s most powerful warships is leaving the theater our own strategy calls central, headed toward a war we are already fighting.
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Perhaps that is the correct decision. But if it is, Washington should acknowledge the risk being accepted and explain how it intends to preserve deterrence in the Pacific. If such tradeoffs become routine, then our stated strategy and our actual force allocation are moving in different directions.
America does not lack military power. It lacks the ability to treat every threat as equally urgent at the same time. That is why strategy requires choices. Iran may demand action today; China remains the larger challenge. Washington must weigh what each requires and decide deliberately. If we don’t set our priorities, events eventually will.
Socialist candidates can delete old posts, but they can't erase their radicalism
This summer, as millions of Americans were enjoying fireworks or gearing up for the fall football season, the campaign of the Democratic Senate candidate in Michigan was scrambling to cover up past statements denouncing both.
You read that right: the campaign of Abdul el-Sayed was caught red-handed by CNN erasing hot takes declaring that "fireworks suck" and linking football to slavery.
On one hand, you can’t blame him. El-Sayed is running for statewide office in Michigan, which voted for President Donald Trump twice in the last decade. Better to take the hit on the flip-flop and sell voters on his canned declaration about his love for "Michigan football on Saturdays" than defend the indefensible.
DEM SENATE HOPEFUL ABDUL EL-SAYED RECOUNTS SMASHING VODKA BOTTLE AFTER BEARD CRITICISM
On the other, if character is what counts when no one is watching, el-Sayed has shown who he is. Voters should believe him.
To be fair, he’s not the only candidate navigating the collision course between a hard-left worldview and the political realities of getting elected in a center-right country.
In neighboring Wisconsin, Francesca Hong, the Democratic Socialist candidate, came up just short in her gubernatorial primary. Unlike el-Sayed, her past social media commentary surfaced before Election Day, including her support for canceling Thanksgiving.
Down the home stretch, Hong’s campaign was overrun with similar questions about some of her past and current extreme views. At one point, the candidate even declared Thanksgiving her "favorite" holiday, but the damage was done.
While some expressed surprise at the narrow margin, the more appropriate question is how Hong came within roughly 4,000 votes of grabbing the nomination in one of America’s most purple states.
One of the leaders of this movement, New York Democrat Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, has deployed a creative tactic when faced with questions about her past views, saying that "Woke 1.0 was crazy."
There are at least three reasons these seemingly unelectable candidates are driving the national conversation this summer.
First, an empowered activist class is stepping up and filling the void of a party in need of new ideas, leaders and voices. The Democratic Party is still reckoning with the scars of the previous election. Until it has reckoned with and acknowledged the mistakes of the past, moving forward becomes difficult.
ALEXANDRIA OCASIO-CORTEZ SHRUGS OFF PAST 'DEFUND THE POLICE' COMMENTS, JOKING 'WOKE 1 WAS CRAZY'
Second, this new crop of candidates grew up in the digital age. El-Sayed is 41. Hong is 37. Ocasio-Cortez is 36. Social media has been readily available to them their entire adult lives. Anyone has a platform to pop off on the news of the day without giving it a great deal of thought. Or how it will look under the glare of a future political campaign.
This phenomenon is not limited to one political party or ideology, either. Any first-time candidate would be wise to audit and clean up their online presence before embarking on their journey into public life.
Finally, and most importantly, many of these sentiments are consistent with the core principle of socialism taking hold within the American left. At its core, socialism believes that the American experiment is over and the dream is dead. What better ways to express that perspective than opposing football, fireworks and Thanksgiving?
SOCIALIST VICTORIES SHOW DEMS' DESCENT DOWN 'DEADLY PATH OF COMMUNISM,' JOHNSON WARNS
Proponents of socialism want voters to believe it’s all about free health care, free pre-K and free college. New York City, under the Mamdani administration, is even pursuing government-run grocery stores. They present their ideology as merely a means of righting the economic wrongs in our country, and duck questions about rgw price tag or practicality with vague platitudes about making the wealthy "pay their fair share."
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It’s no secret the GOP faces a challenging midterm electorate. Early voting starts in some states in a matter of weeks. Trump is not on the ballot, and the ongoing conflict in Iran has bogged down his approval ratings.
Republicans’ best case may well be not just that woke 1.0 was crazy, but it never left the building. Old social media posts and videos can be taken down, but the insight into the world view on philosophy remains – and it’s downright chilling.
Silicon Valley is losing the data center fight, risking a repeat of a classic failure
Silicon Valley has spent decades winning consumer loyalty. In unprecedented numbers, people have Apple iPhones in their pockets and Amazon Alexas on their counters while they browse on Google and write in Microsoft Word. Americans have shown themselves eager to try every new technology, from health tracking rings to doorbell cameras to robot vacuums.
Yet Silicon Valley has seemingly been caught flat-footed facing something it has never faced before: the near-united opposition of the American people. When it comes to artificial intelligence (AI) and data centers, the tech industry has never been more unpopular. The industry that has created the tools of modern life is losing the fight for public opinion because, ironically, it is using the wrong tools, at least in the arena of political advocacy.
The tech industry certainly funds a formidable political machine. But it’s a machine focused on fighting over what happens on screens — content moderation, privacy, antitrust, intellectual property. Its political teams are not built for what AI actually requires: power plants, transmission lines, water rights, land use permits and the approval of hundreds of local communities across America.
TRUMP’S REINDUSTRIALIZATION AGENDA FACES ITS BIGGEST HURDLE — AMERICANS
That mismatch is why the industry is losing — badly.
Local opposition has already blocked or delayed $64 billion in data center projects between May 2024 and March 2025. A Gallup poll found that 71% of Americans oppose data centers being built in their communities — opposition now exceeding that of nuclear power plants. And just recently, New York became the first state to ban data centers.
Companies with enormous influence in Washington are losing at county commission meetings, utility hearings and state legislatures. The problem is not a communications gap. It is a structural one. Before, tech had to win big policy fights just in Washington. Now, it must win countless small fights across the country, not against local communities, but against an organized opposition with years of experience using state and local networks to block development.
Note the activist groups heading the charge against data centers. More than 230 organizations — led by Food & Water Watch and including Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth — have formally demanded a national data center moratorium.
Setting aside for the moment the irony that these so-called environmental groups are trying to thwart the biggest private-sector renewable buildout in history, these are not grassroots organizations. They are well-funded political machines that have lawyers, full-time activists, local chapters and decades of experience stopping energy projects. And some of these organizations have drawn congressional scrutiny over foreign funding: The House Energy and Commerce Committee opened an investigation to explore Chinese influence on U.S. energy policy. The logic is simple: When America fails to invest in energy infrastructure that powers AI, China wins.
No matter how they are funded, these political machines know how to take a legitimate concern about electricity rates or water consumption and turn it into a national campaign against technology itself. They have done it before with fracking and nuclear (again, in both cases, ironically driving up emissions by keeping coal plants online longer).
Fracking offers the tech industry a more hopeful template. The shale industry survived not because it out-lobbied environmentalists in Washington, but because it created direct beneficiaries in hundreds of communities. Landowners received royalties, workers earned paychecks, businesses gained customers, towns collected tax revenue and everyone gained affordable energy. Those benefits created armies of local defenders.
Nuclear, on the other hand, shows what losing looks like. Despite nuclear being an incredible, zero-emissions technology, it lost the political fight in the 1970s before its value was fully understood. America then spent 50 years underbuilding nuclear capacity. It was only surging electricity demand from AI that made nuclear energy essential enough to overcome old opposition.
ANTARES REACHES REACTOR CRITICALITY UNDER TRUMP PILOT PROGRAM, MARKING MAJOR NUCLEAR MILESTONE
Yet the campaign against data centers is moving faster than either of those precedents. The coordinated opposition is already sharing legal strategies, draft language for moratoriums, claims about water waste and grid strain and graphics and social strategies that can travel across the country in an instant.
If the tech industry doesn’t act fast to counter this coordinated opposition with a strategy of its own, it will follow the path of nuclear energy, setting back America’s AI ambitions years, if not decades.
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The largest AI companies have the resources to respond seriously. They can finance dedicated power generation that protects existing ratepayers. They can fund local infrastructure improvements, school programs and economic development that give host communities a genuine stake in the project's success. They can hire people with relationships in state capitals and county seats, not just K Street. And they can invest in pushing out the honest message about AI and data centers, dropping the negative, Silicon Valley-preferred language of "disruption" and "singularity" to talk about real-world benefits, like empowerment, prosperity and security.
Silicon Valley already spends billions building the physical infrastructure of AI. It now needs to invest in the public support that will allow America to build it at all.
Aiden Buzetti is the president of the Bull Moose Project.
Inside the tension that drove Trump’s South Korea alliance from ‘historic new era’ to military pullback
President Donald Trump is scaling back major joint military exercises with South Korea after Seoul declined to support U.S. operations against Iran, a sharp U-turn with an ally his administration publicly praised just days prior.
The move came just three days after Secretary of State Marco Rubio called South Korea an "indispensable partner" and said the allies had entered a "historic new era" of cooperation following Trump’s state visit to Seoul last fall.
Victor Cha, the Korea Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Fox News Digital that Trump appears to see the drill reduction as a win-win for the U.S. — pressure Seoul to move faster on investment and burden-sharing while offer Kim incentives to reopen diplomacy.
"He sees this as a two for one," Cha said. "A combination of things led to Trump's frustration, that South Korea is not moving the trade and investment framework agreement on investments faster and his desire to meet the North Korean leader."
TRUMP ORDERS MAJOR CUT TO US-SOUTH KOREA DRILLS AS NORTH KOREA RAMPS UP MISSILE TESTS
Behind the administration’s recent praise of Seoul, strains had been building, potentially leading to the mixed-messaging.
Trump has grown frustrated with the slow rollout of a $350 billion trade and investment framework, commercial disputes involving American companies and what he sees as South Korea’s unwillingness to do more for U.S. priorities, Cha detailed.
"That combination of things led Trump to make a decision where he said, 'Hey, yeah, I'm gonna scale down these exercises maybe it'll get a response from Kim Jong-un. At the same time, the South Koreans are rich, they should be doing their own exercises and like we should not be paying for them.'"
The deal would bring substantial South Korean investment to the United States while offering Seoul expanded cooperation on shipbuilding and nuclear-powered submarines.
But the first investments have moved slowly, despite Trump’s earlier threat to raise tariffs on South Korean goods by 25%, while parallel agreements with Japan are advancing faster.
The pressure on Seoul comes as Trump returns to another unfinished project from his first term: diplomacy with Kim.
Trump’s tumultuous relationship with the North Korean leader swung between threats of "fire and fury" and historic summits. The first was in Singapore in 2018 and the second in Hanoi in 2019, which was followed by a third meeting at the Korean demilitarized zone later that year.
The formal encounters made Trump the first sitting U.S. president to meet a North Korean leader, but the diplomacy ended without a denuclearization deal after negotiations collapsed over the terms of sanctions relief and North Korea’s nuclear program.
In announcing the exercise cut, Trump wrote that the drills "send a signal that is totally inappropriate and hostile" to North Korea, which he said "has been unthreatening and respectful" during his second term.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for more details. A War Department official said the department is "actively working on executing the Commander-in-Chief’s directive," while declining to offer details.
Kim’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, has said her brother retains good memories of Trump, but North Korea has expanded its nuclear and missile capabilities since the first summits while deepening its ties with Russia and China.
Pyongyang has not ruled out returning to diplomacy, but it has also signaled that Washington would first need to abandon its demand for North Korean denuclearization.
NORTH KOREA LAUNCHES ANOTHER BALLISTIC MISSILE AS US, SOUTH KOREA PREPARE FOR MILITARY DRILLS
"Where they haven't ruled out negotiations with the U.S., but they have basically said, unless the U.S. accepts their nuclear status, there isn't really a reason to talk," Jenny Town, a senior fellow at the Stimson Center and director of 38 North, told Fox News Digital.
The drills are more than a show of force, they are where American and South Korean troops practice how to fight together if deterrence fails — from moving forces and equipment to sharing targeting information and operating under a single command structure.
Before Trump’s order, this year’s Ulchi Freedom Shield exercise was set to incorporate lessons from the war in Ukraine, including drone warfare, GPS disruption and the prospect of losing communications in a crisis.
Those are no longer theoretical concerns for the alliance: North Korean troops have fought alongside Russian forces and brought battlefield experience back to the peninsula.
SOUTH KOREAN PRESIDENT JUMPS TO INVEST IN MILITARY AFTER TRUMP CUTS JOINT EXERCISES
"The exercises are the biggest military maneuver exercise that the Alliance does every year," Cha said. "There's nothing that can substitute for live fire and military exercises."
Town said the last-minute nature of the decision risks creating uncertainty inside the alliance.
"This last minute haphazard way of sending this message really sends a lot of mixed messages, but also creates a lot of angst in the U.S.-South Korea alliance," she said.
Trump’s order drew bipartisan criticism on Capitol Hill.
Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., said: "North and South Korea are still technically at war."
"Our ability to help defend our ally against the North Koreans is because our forces are well trained and able to coordinate with the South Koreans. Hollowing out these joint exercises is shortsighted and a mistake," the retired U.S. Navy Captain added.
Republican Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, a Republican, said reducing the drills "does nothing more than free up thousands of North Korea's troops to support Putin's systematic kidnapping, torture, rape, and murder of innocent Ukrainian citizens."
"President Trump is playing right into Kim Jong-Un's hands," Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., claimed on X.
"Our alliance with South Korea is critical to U.S. security and announcing a decision to unilaterally scale back joint exercises, over social media, all while touting a "very good relationship" with Kim, is a gross miscalculation," she added.
"Trump is rewarding a regime that sends weapons and troops to fight for Russia and has a long history of cooperation with Iran. Undermining our allies while making concessions to our adversaries is not a show of strength—it only emboldens those who threaten us.:"
State of play: What to know about California showdown to replace Swalwell after massive scandal
The special election to fill the seat vacated by former Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., remained undecided in the early Wednesday morning hours.
The battle to succeed Swalwell comes after he resigned in April amid sexual assault allegations from at least five women. Prior to the allegations, Swalwell was also making a bid for California's gubernatorial race, but he dropped that bid as well.
Vying for Swalwell's seat are two women: progressive state Sen. Aisha Wahab and moderate Democrat and Bay Area Rapid Transit Board (BART) President Melissa Hernandez.
Tuesday's primary race will determine who will immediately fill Swalwell's seat for the remainder of the term. However, it is also serving as the primary race for the midterms, meaning that Wahab and Hernandez will face each other again in November.
Wahab and Hernandez both emerged as the "top-two" vote getters in the special election's jungle primary race held on June 16 for California's 14th Congressional District. Under California law, elections have open primaries, meaning whoever the top vote getters are, regardless of their party affiliation, will move on to the general election.
The race between Hernandez and Wahab mirrors a larger trend reflected across Democratic primary races, as far-left progressive candidates, often backed by the Democratic Socialists of America, are seeking to defeat establishment-backed Democratic candidates.
Wahab, who has served in the state Senate since 2022, is running on a campaign platform centered on cracking down on ICE, having co-authored legislation making it easier for citizens to sue agents, lowering prescription drug prices and pushing for investments in green and renewable energy. She has received the backing of Our Revolution, a group that was founded by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Attorney General Rob Bonta, and fellow progressives Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal and Congressman Greg Casar.
Hernandez, on the other hand, has taken a moderate approach on key issues such as immigration. Hernandez, who is the daughter of Mexican immigrants, acknowledged that the immigration system is "broken" but that she "supports smart border security and regional cooperation."
She has received the endorsement of close to a dozen Congressional members.
But despite Wahab's critical stance of ICE, she found herself in the hot seat when her father took to Facebook calling for his daughter's supporters to "call ICE" on Hernandez. The mishap led to Wahab's campaign to issue an apology on its website.