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‘On Day One We Rip All the Woke Out’: DeSantis Vows to Remake US Military as Vets Quit His New Florida State Guard

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Governors who run for president are in the enviable position of holding up their accomplishments and promising to do more of the same on a national level. That is literally the basis of Florida GOP Governor Ron DeSantis‘ presidential campaign. He promised to “Make America Florida.”

But as the DeSantis presidential campaign sputters and flails, with the Florida Republican firing campaign staff amid heavy spending and weak poll numbers, the governor continues to campaign on the promise of turning America into a version of what he likes to call the “free state of Florida.”

How are things in the free state of Florida?

While inflation has plummeted to a mere 3% nationally, down from over 9% just one year ago, Florida’s inflation is the highest in the country,  more than double the national average, with several metro areas labeled inflation “hot spots” thanks in large part to housing woes. The Florida housing crisis stems from massive home owners insurance hikes, and DeSantis’ focus on chasing undocumented workers out of the Sunshine State. One year ago in May, CBS News labeled Florida “the least affordable place to live in the U.S.”

RELATED: DeSantis Says He Will Turn ‘Woke Military’ Away From ‘Gender Ideology’ and Reach ‘Settlement’ in Russia’s War Against Ukraine

To great concern from critics last year, DeSantis restarted the Florida State Guard, an entity first created in 1941 that his predecessors effectively shut down. Lawmakers handed him an initial $10 million. Earlier this month Florida lawmakers hiked their initial approval from 400 troops to 1500.

In announcing he was reconstituting the Florida State Guard, DeSantis suggested its purpose was “to respond to a projected active hurricane season,” and added: “In a natural disaster-prone state such as Florida with a potentially active hurricane season on the horizon, there is a clear and present need for a larger civilian emergency response force.”

That claim is repeated on the Florida State Guard’s official government website.

“In a state that battles hurricanes, wildfires, tornadoes and more every year, we are prepared for whatever mother nature may bring,” the front page of the Florida State Guard’s website reads.

“Funded at the state level, the Florida State Guard partners with the Florida National Guard and other disaster response agencies to respond quickly and ensure that communities are provided with humanitarian assistance and disaster response services they desperately need. The Florida State Guard is able to stay longer than the National Guard, at the discretion of the Governor, to provide humanitarian and disaster response services over a greater period of time—allowing the National Guard to return to other duties. The two forces complement each other.”

Despite that very publicly-stated focus,  the veterans DeSantis’ State Guard hired are quitting, with some saying they are being trained as a paramilitary force, a joint report from the Miami Herald and Tampa Bay Times states.

“According to records reviewed by the Herald/Times and interviews with program volunteers, a number of recruits quit after the first training class last month because they feared it was becoming too militaristic.”

Many of the recruits are veterans from the U.S. Armed Forces.

READ MORE: ‘Woke Ideology’: DeSantis Vows to Kill Four Federal Agencies – Including One That Manages US Nuclear Weapons

“Weeks into that inaugural June training, one volunteer, a disabled retired Marine Corps captain, called the local sheriff’s office to report he was battered by Florida National Guard instructors when they forcibly shoved him into a van after he questioned the program and its leadership,” the report states.

Major General John D. Haas, Florida’s adjutant general overseeing the Florida National Guard, the Herald reported, in a statement “said the State Guard was a ‘military organization’ that will be used not just for emergencies but for ‘aiding law enforcement with riots and illegal immigration.'”

A retired 20-year Navy veteran, Brian Newhouse, told the Herald: “The program got hijacked and turned into something that we were trying to stay away from: a militia.”

“On the first day of training,” the report states, “Newhouse said he was escorted off the base after lodging several complaints, including that the National Guard’s schedule required training on Sundays, instead of allowing members to use those days for religious services and personal time, as was the original plan.”

How did DeSantis’ first class do?

“On June 30, the State Guard graduated its first class, 120 recruits, far below the 1,500 members state lawmakers approved this year.”

And yet, DeSantis, a former Navy lawyer (“JAG” officer) is touring the country, hitting battleground states, and attacking the U.S. Military, and its Commander in Chief.

READ MORE: Viral Video: DeSantis in Jerusalem Explodes Over Questions About His Alleged Role in Gitmo Force Feeding

The Florida governor claims the U.S. Armed Forces are “woke,” because of President Biden, and unable to successfully recruit.

He promises to remake America’s military.

“When we talk about reinstalling integrity in our institutions, we mean things like our own military,” DeSantis told supporters in South Carolina.  “You know, I volunteered to serve in the Navy, volunteered to serve in Iraq, got to serve alongside a lot of great patriots, got to be part of a mission greater than myself, and really was happy to have done it.”

He claimed, “for the first time in my life, I have veterans coming up to me all too frequently saying, ‘I don’t know if I’d want my kids or grandkids to serve in today’s military.’ Why? Because they’re focusing on political agendas, woke ideology, things that are not central to mission accomplishment that causes morale to decline, and it causes recruiting to suffer and even at the height of the fighting in Iraq in places like Fallujah where I served, you still had people showing up to sign up for the Marine Corps and the army knowing their next stop was going to be western Iraq.”

DeSantis claims “people are not signing up because they want to sign up to a military that is focused on the mission. They don’t want to join a woke military. They don’t want to be part of social experimentation. And so as Commander in Chiefon day one, we rip all the woke out and we get back to business and the military. We’re going to be serious about it.”

Watch below or at this link.

 

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News

Trump Doubles Down Calling Egg Prices ‘Too Low’ as Costs Soar to Record Highs

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6 hours ago

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April 18, 2025

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In the days leading up to Easter, President Donald Trump has repeatedly—and falsely—claimed that egg prices have plummeted to the point of being “too low,” baselessly citing steep double-digit declines—even as Americans face record-high prices at the grocery store.

“The egg prices are down 87 percent, but nobody talks about that,” the President said on Friday. “You can have all the eggs you want, we have too many eggs, in fact, if anything the prices are getting too low.”

Trump campaigned on the promise he would lower the price of groceries “on day one,” a promise that three months later is not only unfulfilled, but in some cases reversed: overall grocery prices have risen.

READ MORE: ‘Taunting SCOTUS’: Concerns Mount Over ‘Openly Contemptuous’ White House

On Thursday, Trump claimed the price of eggs had dropped 92%, while berating a reporter and his Federal Reserve Chairman.

“The price of groceries are substantially down,” the president falsely claimed.

The price of eggs, you know, when I came in, they hit me with eggs. I just got there, I was here for one week, and they started screaming, ‘Eggs have gone through the roof.’ I said, ‘I just got here.’

“They went up 87%, and you couldn’t get them,” Trump told reporters. “They said, ‘You won’t have eggs for Easter,’ which is coming up. Happy Easter, everybody.You won’t have eggs for Easter.”

“And we did an unbelievable job, and now eggs are all over the place and the price went down 92 percent,” he claimed.

READ MORE: Trump’s Latest Target: The Watchdog That Keeps Suing Him

Last week on Monday, Trump had claimed, falsely, that egg prices had dropped 79%.

Egg prices, Newsweek reported on Wednesday, “continued to climb despite recent efforts by the Trump administration to combat the shortage brought about by the ongoing bird flu with imports of Turkish eggs. The CPI egg index jumped by 5.9 percent from February and was up 60.4 percent compared to March 2024, and the average price for a dozen grade A large eggs climbed 5.6 percent to a record $6.23.”

Moe Davis, the well-known retired U.S. Air Force colonel, attorney, and former administrative law judge, posted to social media a federal government chart of egg prices.

“According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics,” Davis wrote, “the price of a dozen eggs in March was $6.23, the highest price ever recorded and 26% higher than in January when Trump took office. Of course if Trump says egg prices are down then the MAGA cult is obliged to say egg prices are down.”

Watch the video above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Things Like This Take Place’: Trump Shrugs Off Mass Shooting Despite Once Being a Target

 

Image via Reuters

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‘Taunting SCOTUS’: Concerns Mount Over ‘Openly Contemptuous’ White House

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9 hours ago

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April 18, 2025

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The Trump White House is coming under fire for what appears to be an attempt to mock the U.S. Supreme Court, the facts in the case of a Maryland man wrongly deported to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador, and The New York Times.

The White House’s official account on the social media platform X posted a “corrected” version of a New York Times story—corrections that have drawn concern and scorn from the legal community and political commentators.

“Senator Meets With Wrongly Deported Maryland Man in El Salvador,” read a screenshot of the Times’ headline.

But the White House’s version (below), complete with red ink and cross outs, reads: “Senator Meets With MS-13 Illegal Alien in El Salvador Who Is Never Coming Back.”

The White House added remarks saying, “Fixed it for you, @NYTimes. Oh, and by the way, @ChrisVanHollen — he’s NOT coming back.”

Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) traveled to El Salvador this week and, after several days, was finally permitted to meet with Kilmar Abrego Garcia—the legal U.S. resident whom the Trump administration has admitted in court it wrongly deported. Multiple courts, including the Supreme Court, have ordered the administration to “facilitate” his return. Yet the Trump administration appears to be refusing.

Friday’s claim that Abrego Garcia is “never coming back” was taken as a serious statement of intent by some.

Attorney Aaron Regunberg wrote: “The White House is saying he’s ‘never coming back’ — they are explicitly declaring they will violate a unanimous Supreme Court order.” Calling out Senate Democratic Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, Regunberg wrote: “you said this was your red line that would trigger ‘extraordinary action.’ So…where the f— are you?”

“2 telling things here,” offered The Washington Post’s senior political reporter Aaron Blake. “1) White House crosses out ‘wrongly,’ despite repeatedly acknowledging its error in court. 2) ‘who’s never coming back’ is basically taunting SCOTUS. Signals the opposite of any intent to ‘facilitate’ his return.”

“The White House press shop lies and claims Mr. Abrego was not wrongfully deported, despite having acknowledged that fact at every single stage of the court process; at the district court, the circuit court, and the Supreme Court,” noted attorney Aaron Reichlin-Melnick. “They are openly contemptuous of the truth.”

Civil rights attorney Patrick Jaicomo, replying to the White House, wrote: “There is a mistake in the headline. You didn’t wrongly deport Garcia. You wrongly imprisoned him without due process. So, fix your mistake, as the courts have ordered. You don’t have to keep doubling down on bad decisions.”

Attorney Dilan Esper added, “I’ll remind you that the federal judges issuing orders see this.”

Veteran journalist John Harwoood called it, “disgusting fascism,” and wrote that “the Trump WH is garbage from top to bottom.”

Opinion writer Magdi Jacobs noted, “They’re moving from evading the judiciary to openly mocking it. This is very dangerous territory.”

Some others addressed what they appeared to suggest was the juvenile nature of the White House’s post.

“When you graduate from 4chan and land your first job at the White House,” wrote Talking Points Memo publisher Josh Marshall.

“The Trump admin really wants to distract people from the fact that it illegally sent someone to El Salvador in violation of a court order & binding law, either out of malice or sheer incompetence. No amount of s—posting will change that,” said Reason magazine’s Billy Binion.

“This is the evil of the Trump White House,” remarked Fred Wellman, an Army veteran, political consultant, and the host of the podcast “On Democracy.”

Journalist and author Robert Lusetich observed: “The White House, an ever-lasting symbol of the power, dignity and greatness of the United States. Now, a trolling meme account.”

Anti-gun-violence activist Fred Guttenberg declared the White House is “staffed by pathetic punk 2nd grade pre pubescent children.”

Journalist James Surowiecki commented, “Your tax dollars are paying for this childish cr–.”

See the White House’s social media post above or at this link.

 

Image via Reuters

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Trump’s Latest Target: The Watchdog That Keeps Suing Him

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11 hours ago

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April 18, 2025

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From the outset of his 2024 presidential campaign, Donald Trump signaled that a central focus of his presidency would be targeting and exacting retribution against his critics.

“In 2016, I declared, ‘I am your voice,’” Trump told attendees at CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference in March 2023. “Today, I add: I am your warrior. I am your justice. And for those who have been wronged and betrayed, I am your retribution.”

In keeping his retribution vow, Trump in just three months—often with the use of the power of his executive orders—has targeted for retribution numerous top law firms, revoked the security clearances of dozens of top national security experts, former government officials, and former political opponents. He has targeted top universities, threaten to defund millions of dollars or more in critical research grants, and declared top news outlets CNN and MSNBC “corrupt” and “illegal.”

Just days after the 2024 election, NPR reported that during the campaign, “Trump made more than 100 threats to investigate, prosecute, imprison or otherwise punish his perceived enemies, including political opponents and private citizens.”

READ MORE: ‘Things Like This Take Place’: Trump Shrugs Off Mass Shooting Despite Once Being a Target

On Thursday, Trump threatened to go after one of his top legal critics: CREW, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a nonprofit legal and ethics watchdog that has been working for years to hold him (and others) to account, often by suing.

Asked by a reporter what group he would like to see have their tax exempt status removed, Trump replied, “Well, we’ll be making some statements, but it’s a big deal.”

“They’re so rich and so strong, and then they go so bad, they’ve earned so much by being a member of this country, you know, a member of this group, this beautiful group of people in this country, and then they go and they abuse their power like that,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office Thursday afternoon. “I think it’s, you know, I think it’s very sad.”

“I have a group named CREW,” he continued. “CREW. You ever hear of it? I think it’s CREW, and they have a guy that heads CREW. It’s supposed to be a charitable organization. The only charity they had is going after Donald Trump. So we’re looking at that.”

“We’re looking at a lot of things, but if you take a look at CREW, what they’ve done, and I think it was a very big abuse, but we’re going to be finding out pretty soon.”

During Trump’s first and second terms, CREW sued Trump or his administration for alleged emoluments clause violations, alleged Presidential Records Act noncompliance, and challenged some of his executive orders. It also represented voters in a lawsuit attempting to use the 14th Amendment to remove him from the ballot, claiming his role in the January 6, 2021 insurrection was constitutionally disqualifying.

READ MORE: ‘Full Time Babysitter’: Treasury Secretary Urges Caution After Trump Fed Chair Threat

In January, CREW was part of a lawsuit suing to “block Trump’s illegal plan to fire government workers,” and in February, CREW sued the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) “to compel transparency.”

CREW, in a statement to NCRM, vowed to continue its work.

“For more than 20 years, CREW has exposed government corruption from politicians of both parties who violate the public trust and has worked to promote an ethical, transparent government,” CREW Vice President of Communications Jordan Libowitz said. “Good governance groups are the heart of a healthy democracy. We will continue to do our work to ensure Americans have an ethical and accountable government.”

Legal experts are blasting Trump’s threat.

“It is literally a federal crime punishable by up to five years in prison for the President, VP, or any senior White House employee, to ‘request, directly or indirectly, any officer or employee of the IRS to conduct … an audit or other investigation of any particular taxpayer,'” wrote attorney Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, a senior fellow at the American Immigration Council.

“The Trump administration has gone after law firms, they’ve gone after universities, and they’re now going after civil society, including groups like @CREWcrew. They want to silence any opposition to their extreme agenda,” added the National Women’s Law Center.

“President Trump is now threatening to weaponize the IRS against nonprofit organizations like @CREWcrew,” wrote Public Citizen. “He is attacking our most basic right: to say what we believe without fear of government prosecution. We proudly stand in solidarity with our friends at CREW.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

Watch the video above or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Stunning Admission’: GOP Senator Says Colleagues ‘Are All Afraid’ of ‘Retaliation’

Image via Reuters

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