Amber Duke

There’s nothing ‘distinguished’ about Dr. Anthony Fauci

Georgetown University beclowned itself yet again this week by hiring Dr. Anthony Fauci to teach at the medical school as a distinguished professor. “Dr. Anthony Fauci will serve as a distinguished university professor in Georgetown Medicine’s Department of Medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases, an academic division that researches and trains future physicians in infectious diseases, starting July 1,” the university announced. Fauci will also serve in a role at the McCourt School of Public Policy. https://www.instagram.

anthony fauci

Chris Christie goes soft on trans issues

Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie has come out against banning sex changes for minors, putting him at odds not just with the conservative base of the GOP, but with a large majority of Americans. "I don't think that the government should ever be stepping in to the place of the parents in helping to move their children through a process where those children are confused or concerned about their gender," Christie said in a CNN interview Sunday. "The fact is that folks who are under the age of eighteen should have parental support, and guidance, and love as they make all the key decisions of their life, and this should not be one that's excluded by the government in any way.

Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)

Is academia rotten to the core?

Another phony Harvard professor? Say it ain’t so! Harvard Business School professor Francesca Gino is reportedly on administrative leave with the university amid a review of alleged fraud within her body of research. A group of three professors from other top universities, who collectively run a data blog called "Data Colada," say they first flagged the purported fraud to Harvard Business School in 2021. This group of researchers claimed at the time that at least four papers authored by Gino contained falsified data — and they believed that many more of her papers had similar issues. “In the fall of 2021, we shared our concerns with Harvard Business School (HBS).

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Why conservative boycotts should terrify corporations

Nike. Ulta. Bud Light. Anthropologie. Target. My boycott list is growing larger by the day. For the record, I’m pretty darn good at shopping according to my values. I haven’t purchased a single Nike product since the company pulled a planned shoe line featuring the Betsy Ross American flag because anthem-kneeler Colin Kaepernick convinced them it was racist. I quickly pivoted to purchasing Adidas products instead. Well, that is until Adidas started advertising women’s swimsuits using male models. Sigh. This boycotting business can be tough, especially when it means forgoing otherwise quality products or paying a higher price for alternatives.

boycotts

DeSantis PAC accused of astroturfing in Iowa

Never Back Down PAC, the political action committee supporting Florida governor Ron DeSantis, has caused a stir in early voting state Iowa — but maybe not in the way they had hoped. The PAC is being accused of disrespecting the Black Hawk County Republicans by sending too many activists to the group's participation in a local parade last weekend. The Black Hawk County Republican chair, Craig Lohmann, sent an email invitation to the campaigns of the GOP primary candidates to walk with them in the annual My Waterloo Days parade. In the email, Lohmann says that campaigns may send "a few" representatives "with shirts with names and some handouts." He cautioned the campaigns and associated PACs to avoid giving the impression that the Black Hawk County GOP was endorsing any candidate.

ron desantis pac iowa never back down

How they treat trans children across the pond

England's National Health Service made the major announcement last week that they would limit the prescription of puberty-blocking drugs for transgender children to clinical trials. A report released by the NHS on June 9 states that "there is not enough evidence to support their safety or clinical effectiveness as a routinely available treatment and that they should only be accessed as part of research." The decision is the latest consequence of a multi-year review into how the medical community in England should treat children who suffer from gender dysphoria.

LGBT activists gather outside the Stonewall Inn (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

The GOP is sprinting away from criminal justice reform

When President Donald Trump signed the First Step Act in 2018, it was heralded by leaders of both political parties and the mainstream media as a massive bipartisan victory. The legislation developed a risk and needs assessment program to reduce recidivism rates for federal prisoners, amended the good time credits system, shortened mandatory minimums for drug offenders and redressed pre-2010 sentencing disparities for crack versus powdered cocaine offenses. In the five years since it hit the president's desk, though, the First Step Act has become a source of controversy within the Republican Party.

criminal justice reform

Beware the New York Times kids section

“Stinky. Sweaty. Hairy. Pimply. Totally Normal.”  That’s the seemingly innocent tagline of the “Puberty Issue” of the New York Times for Kids, which appears in the print newspaper on the last Sunday of every month.  The kids section, which was started in March 2017 as a part of the New York Times magazine department, often looks harmless at first glance. The cover typically boasts colorful and engaging artwork, while inside, children are greeted with cartoons, games, puzzles and mini articles about cool accomplishments by other kids. Past issues covered how kids could spend their summer vacations, interesting facts about bugs and other creepy critters, and how to start growing a garden.

The New York Times for Kids ‘Puberty Issue’ (Amber Athey/The Spectator)

Scoop: Gavin Wax lawyers up after Babylon Bee dismissal

Gavin Wax, the New York Young Republicans chairman who was publicly fired from the Babylon Bee last week for directing a curse word at a DeSantis campaign operative, is pursuing legal action against his former employer. A letter from Wax's lawyers to Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon reveals that they are currently investigating potential employment law violations in preparation for a lawsuit, according to a copy of the letter obtained by The Spectator. "It is clear from what is known at this point that Mr. Wax has multiple statutory and common-law employment and tort claims against you and your company," the letter says.

gavin wax babylon bee

The truth about ‘book bans’

The left is hard launching its response to the parental rights movement sweeping the country, and it has settled on a nifty phrase: “book bans.” Numerous media headlines, advocacy organization press releases and activist social media posts have decried the so-called right-wing Christian fascists attempting to stifle intellectual freedom by pulling scores of books from school libraries and classrooms.  PEN America, a nonprofit group of writers committed to free expression, has described the effort by parents to exert some influence over what books children are exposed to in school as “deeply undemocratic”. Children are “losing access to literature”, the group says.

Book ban

Can the Heritage Foundation unite the right?

Last September I was sitting in the crowd at the annual National Conservatism Conference, lamenting the fact that my hotel room had no hot water, when Dr. Kevin Roberts, the president of the Heritage Foundation, took the stage at Miami’s JW Marriott for his plenary address. Nationalists and populists at the conference were suspicious of Dr. Roberts’s presence. The “New Right” had spent the past few years accusing the right-wing establishment, including the cache of center-right DC-based think tanks like Heritage, of selling out ordinary Americans for profit and influence.

heritage

State Department offers counseling to staff it misgendered

The State Department sent an all-staff email Friday apologizing for misgendering people with its new pronoun system and offered counseling to parties who may have been offended by the systems error. The Spectator is exclusively publishing a copy of the email: The Washington Free Beacon first reported that the State Department's plan to allow employees to add pronouns to their emails backfired spectacularly. Apparently, the State Department's system began randomly assigning pronouns to employees rather than allowing them to choose their preferred pronouns. This "unfortunate mistake" led to "hurt" and "distress", according to the State Department's chief information officer Kelly Fletcher.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken delivers remarks (Getty Images)

How Title 42’s expiry will upend the immigration system

The pandemic-era immigration policy known as Title 42 came to end alongside the nation's public health emergency Friday. Its expiry is expected to throw the southern border into further chaos. Title 42 refers to a portion of US code that gives the federal government the authority to curb migration during public health crises. The Trump administration implemented the policy to quickly eject illegal border crossers, including those who claimed asylum, amid the Covid-19 pandemic. Administration officials at the time warned that border crossers could both spread the virus to American citizens, as well as to each other if held in close quarters in detention facilities, at a time when the US was mostly prohibiting travel from other countries.

title 42

Hunter Biden is running out of time

We've come a long way in the two and a half years since the contents of Hunter Biden's laptop were unleashed on the world. In addition to the splashy, X-rated photos and videos of Hunter surrounded by drugs and prostitutes, the New York Post's reporting honed in on a set of emails that suggested Hunter's foreign business dealings involved his father, President Joe Biden. In one email, an official for the Ukrainian energy company Burisma thanks Hunter for the "opportunity" to meet then-Vice President Biden. In another, Hunter's business partner alludes to setting aside 10 percent of a deal with a Chinese firm for "the Big Guy." These bombshells served as the flashpoint for a series of investigations that are finally nearing their conclusion.

hunter biden

Pursued by the trans mob with Liz Wheeler on campus

Harrisonburg, Virginia We're sitting at the lobby bar of a Hyatt eating snacks, killing time until Liz Wheeler's speech on transgenderism at James Madison University, which is slated for 6 pm. Liz's private security suggested we not wait on campus, given the death threats she and her family have received over the past couple of weeks since the event was announced. A young man takes a few steps through the lobby, looks at Liz, stops, and backtracks behind a wall. Liz whips her head to me. "Do you think he recognized me?" she asks. She's on edge until the man re-emerges behind the bar wearing a name tag. He works here. Sigh of relief.

Liz Wheeler speaks at James Madison University

Illinois high school offers racially segregated math classes

A high school in Illinois is offering math classes segregated by race, according to course listings for the 2023-24 school year found on the school's website. There are at least five course offerings at Evanston Township High School that are only open to either black or "Latinx" students. A course description for an Algebra 2 class, for example, states that "this code for the course is restricted to students who identify as Latinx, all genders." An Advanced Placement Calculus class is similarly "restricted to students who identify as Black, all genders." There is a separate AP Calculus course for "Latinx" students, as well.

evanston township high school illinois race
therapy sessions therapist

Scoop: how Critical Race Theory is taking over your therapy sessions

Leaked Facebook messages provided exclusively to The Spectator reveal how therapists are using counseling sessions with their patients to push left-wing ideas of race and gender. Approximately half a dozen licensed mental health professionals in a Facebook group in Indiana had in-depth discussions about how to inject systemic racism into sessions with patients who problems or goals were seemingly unrelated to that topic. The therapists also strategized on how to work with patients who were resistant to the idea that the real source of their issues was societal bigotry or that they might be bigoted themselves.

Source: Abby Grossberg told me she ‘loved’ working for Tucker Carlson

Sources familiar with Abby Grossberg's time at Fox News are raising further questions about claims made in a lawsuit filed by the former booker against the network, which accuses Tucker Carlson of encouraging a sexist and hostile workplace environment. Grossberg describes in her suit how her colleagues at Carlson's show hung up and laughed at pictures of then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi in a low-cut bathing suit, routinely and harshly judged women based on their appearance and made comments meant to belittle her for being Jewish and a woman. "On October 26, 2022, less than a month and a half after starting at Tucker Carlson Tonight, Ms.

Abby Grossberg (MSNBC screenshot)

Confirmed: ex-Tucker Carlson producer suing Tucker Carlson has never met Tucker Carlson

Lawyers for Abby Grossberg confirmed to The Spectator that the former Fox News producer never actually met Tucker Carlson in person while working on his show. "Like many on the [Tucker Carlson Tonight] staff, Abby never met Tucker Carlson in person because he taped the show from his personal studios in Maine and Florida, and he did not visit Fox's NY HQ during her time there," Kimberly A. Catala, one of the attorneys representing Grossberg, said. The statement confirms a recent report from a former Fox News employee and complicates the story about Carlson, Grossberg and the workplace environment on the show he hosted — as well as the lawsuit's alleged connection to Carlson's firing on Monday.

abby grossberg tucker carlson

Are the Walter Cronkite journalism awards for real?

It's no secret that mainstream journalism awards have gone to the dogs. The Washington Post and the New York Times both received Pulitzer Prizes for their "reporting" on Russiagate, for example, though their stories desperately hinted at a conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia that didn't actually exist. The NYT's Nikole Hannah-Jones received a Pulitzer for the widely debunked 1619 Project. The Walter Cronkite Award has previously been given to NBC News's Chuck Todd for excluding so-called "climate deniers" from his broadcasts, a CNN journalist who described the 2020 riots in Kenosha as "fiery but mostly peaceful" was nominated for an Emmy, and the New York Press bestowed CNN's Jim Acosta with a "Truth to Power" award.

walter kronkite NBC News reporter Ben Collins (YouTube Screenshot)