According to Outkick, an online sports publication, the University of Nevada Reno’s women’s volleyball team held a vote among players and voted to forfeit the scheduled Oct. 26 match against San Jose State, because of SJSU’s transgender player Blaire Fleming.
Earlier, the Nevada athletic department said in an exclusive statement to OutKick that the team would play the scheduled match. But evidently the players have a different idea of what a fair playing field is.
“We, the University of Nevada Reno women’s volleyball team, forfeit against San Jose State University and stand united in solidarity with the volleyball teams of Southern Utah University, Boise State University, the University of Wyoming, and Utah State University,” the team wrote in an exclusive statement to OutKick.
“We demand that our right to safety and fair competition on the court be upheld. We refuse to participate in any match that advances injustice against female athletes.”
San Jose’s women’s team plays New Mexico, which lost to Nevada over the weekend.
In Alaska, Rep. Jamie Allard has been working to get legislation passed that reserves girls teams for actual girls, rather than allowing boys to play on the teams simply because they want to. Last year, her legislation died in the Democrat-controlled Senate.
Exxon Mobil Corporation has executed the largest offshore carbon dioxide (CO2) storage lease in U.S. history with the Texas General Land Office.
The lease is for over 271,000 acres and complements the onshore CO2 storage program ExxonMobil is developing. The company said this lease solidifies the U.S. Gulf Coast as a carbon capture and storage leader.
The carbon dioxide, collected from various industry sources, is pumped beneath the seabed and thousands of feet underground into depleted oil and gas fields beneath impervious rock layers, as explained in this video:
It’s unclear what impact the development of massive CO2 storage in the Gulf of Mexico has on the fledgling carbon storage industry that is being created in Alaska, led by Gov. Mike Dunleavy, who is looking for an “all of the above” approach to energy.
This year, the Alaska Legislature passed the governor’s legislation that created a commercial framework to regulate carbon storage, natural gas storage, as well as state financing for natural gas in Cook Inlet and geothermal energy. It is the administration’s hope that such an industry will provide a new revenue stream for Alaska. The market for Alaska would primarily be Japan, at this point. That island nation is looking for a place to bury its CO2.
The Exxon lease will primarily benefit the Texas Permanent School Fund, providing millions in funding to Texas public schools, the State land office said.
Exxon’s history in Alaska Alaska spans nearly 100 years since drilling its first well at Yakataga Beach in 1925.
Since then, the company explored throughout Alaska, including Cook Inlet, the Alaska Peninsula, St. George Basin, Norton Sound, Navarin Basin, Yukon Flats, Beaufort Sea, and the North Slope. It is one of the top three producers in Alaska and owns a share in the Trans Alaska Pipeline. After developing the Point Thomson field, ExxonMobil transferred operations to Hilcorp, but retains a working interest in Point Thomson, Prudhoe Bay, Endicott, and Kuparuk fields.
Alaska Rep. Mary Peltola applied for an endorsement from a major defund-the-police group — and she got it.
MoveOn.org said it is proud to endorse Peltola in her quest to return to Congress this November. The money will soon flow into her campaign.
“The state once had a strong, respected presence in Washington, D.C., but today, political gridlock and outmigration are threatening Alaska’s unique way of life,” MoveOn wrote in its endorsement. By once, they may not mean in the past two years but the 49 prior years during Rep. Don Young’s term in office, but the group’s meaning is unclear.
MoveOn is a nonprofit and leftist political action committee formed in 1998 to distract the political world from the sex scandals of President Bill Clinton, it pioneered the use of viral email petitions to prevent his impeachment.
In 2020, it was central to the defund-the-police movement around the country. Peltola, in her request for an endorsement and funding from MoveOn, said her beliefs align with the group’s mission.
“Mary Peltola continues to try to pull the wool over Alaskans’ eyes, but it’s clear to see that she is a member of the hard left, said Nick Begich, the Republican candidate who opposes her. “Mary Peltola sought and received the endorsement of an organization that wants to defund police and leave our southern border wide open. This is radical. This is extreme. This is not what we expect from an Alaska representative. It’s time for Alaska to move on from Mary Peltola.”
With three weeks left until Election Day, OpenSecretspredicts that 2024’s federal election cycle is on track to be the costliest ever, with a total cost of at least $15.9 billion in spending. This will surpass the 2020 cycle’s record-smashing total of $15.1 billion.
Outside groups, largely super PACs, have spent roughly $2.6 billion on 2024 federal elections, outpacing spending in any previous cycle. If the current spending trends hold, OpenSecrets projects that total outside spending for the entire election cycle will exceed $5 billion.
This staggering price tag of the 2024 election cycle comes with caveats. Inflation between 2020 and 2024 has been significant. When adjusted for inflation, the 2020 total fundraising total would be the equivalent of $18.3 billion in 2024 dollars.
2020 presidential primaries were significantly more expensive
Former NYC Mayor MichaelBloomberg ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020 and singularly spent $1 billion of his own money on the race during a short 30-day period before dropping out on March 4th, 2020.
In contrast, neither Vice President Kamala Harris nor former President Donald Trump are expected to have spent or raised $1 billion through the end of September.
Combined, Bloomberg and fellow 2020 Democratic presidential candidate Tom Steyer spent over $1.4 billion in their own funds to self-finance their 2020 primary campaigns. Even without factoring in that unprecedented influx of self-funding, Democratic candidates in the 2020 primary still outspent Republican candidates in the 2024 Republican primary by about $500 million.
2024 presidential general election fundraising trends
Fundraising trends are moving in different directions for Harris and Trump. The replacement of President Joe Biden with Harris on the ticket has spurred an enormous boost in fundraising on the Democratic side.
While Harris has not announced September fundraising totals, Harris and the Democratic Party are projected to have raised about $1 billion or more from July through September, based on information provided by the Harris campaign documenting weekend fundraising totals, and what they reported for July and August.
Trump and the Republican Party raised $430 million over the same period, including fundraising totals announced by the campaign and party committee for the month of September as well as what was reported to the FEC in prior months. If fundraising trends continue, this will likely result in Harris exceeding the Biden campaign’s 2020 receipts, while Trump may struggle to match what his campaign reported in 2020.
Going into the final stretch before Election Day, the Harris campaign has not yet reported its fundraising totals from September, but as of the end of August, Harris and the Democratic Party reported $404 million cash on hand. Trump and the Republican Party reported having $283 million at the end of September. Based on previous trends OpenSecrets expects this to be spent before Election Day, in addition to money that will be raised during October, which could easily exceed another $500 million. OpenSecrets analysis of FEC data from 2020 shows the two general election campaigns, along with the RNC and DNC, combined to spend over $1.1 billion between Oct. 1 and Nov. 23.
Outside spending is up, favoring Republicans
As OpenSecrets has reported, outside spending for 2024 is well outpacing previous cycles.
As of Oct.7, outside spending — largely through independent expenditures purchased by super PACs and hybrid PACs — reached $2.6 billion, nearly a billion dollars more than outside groups had spent by the same point in 2020. With a full month of spending yet to be reported, OpenSecrets projects that 2024 outside spending will surpass 2020 spending before Election Day, even accounting for inflation.
This outside spending significantly favors conservatives so far, a switch from 2020 where liberal groups spent more money than conservatives. As has now become standard, the groups spending the most money are the presidential-candidate-linked super PACs with Make America Great Again Inc. spending over $239 million supporting Trump, while Future Forward has spent over $212 million supporting Democratic presidential candidates.
Cryptocurrency-linked super PAC Fairshake and its affiliates have spent $123 million supporting both Democratic and Republican candidates, an unusual pattern among top-spending super PACs.
While outside spending groups are generally required to disclose donors to the Federal Election Commission, there are exceptions.
Future Forward, the pro-Harris super PAC, discloses donors to the FEC but its top donor is a dark money nonprofit organization, Future Forward USA Action and therefore is classified by OpenSecrets as a partially disclosing organization.
On the congressional side, each of the four super PACs linked to party leadership are also partially-disclosing groups. Combined they have reported receiving nearly $72 million in contributions from their affiliated dark money groups. This obfuscation of the true source of funds to super PACs is a commonly used method by political groups to bypass meaningful disclosure, and we continue to see significant spending by non-disclosing groups.
Congressional races seeing more money than in 2020
While the race to the White House typically dominates coverage during presidential cycles, 2024 congressional candidates are also attracting record spending. The limit for donations from individuals to candidates increased from $2,800 to $3,300 per election over that four-year time period. This means that over an election cycle an individual can now give $1,000 more to a federal candidate than they could four years ago.
With the Senate held by Democrats and the House by Republicans, both parties hold spending advantages in the chamber they hold.
In the House, the spending gap is small. But in the Senate, Democrats have outspent Republicans by over $150 million. In every swing Senate race, the Democratic candidate has raised/spent at least 75% more than their Republican counterpart, including races where neither candidate is an incumbent.
While Republicans have currently outspent Democrats in the lower chamber, this trend might not hold in the next few months. Democrats running in the general election have collectively outraised Republicans, hinting that Republicans may have faced more active primaries or spent more of their money earlier.
Democrats running in the general election have, on average, about $175,000 more cash on hand than Republicans. This generally includes fundraising through the end of June with some candidates in later primaries having reported more recent fundraising information.
Where does the money come from?
While Bloomberg is not spending money on his own campaign this cycle, he still ranks among the cycle’s top donors – behind five conservative donors. This is the first cycle where the top 5 megadonorsare all supporting Republicans, contributing to a major fundraising advantage conservative outside spending groups have seen so far.
The top 10 individual donors have contributed $599 million – 7% of all money raised – thus far for the 2024 cycle. Extending the list to the top 100 donors shows that they account for 16% of all fundraising, and extending it further to the top 1% of all donors accounts for a full 50% of all money raised. In contrast, all donors giving under $200 account for just 16% of all money raised. With conservative groups outpacing their liberal counterparts in outside spending this cycle, it is no surprise that the top five individual donors to outside groups are conservative givers.
The total fundraising from small donors, as an overall percentage of fundraising, has hovered around 20% for several presidential cycles with a notable uptick in the 2020 cycle.
Democrats running for federal office in 2024 have taken substantially more from small donors giving under $200 than their Republican counterparts. So far, 28% of donations to Democratic candidates are from small donors, compared to 19% to Republicans.
Doug Weber, Dan Auble, Andrew Mayersohn, Olivia Buckley and Anna Massoglia contributed to this report.
Methodological Notes:
In estimating the final total cost of the federal election for 2024, OpenSecrets used the 2020 election as a guide for predicting how much money remains to be spent. Some extenuating circumstances from 2020 were excluded. First, the extraordinary infusion of self-funding, $1.4 billion, from Michael Bloomberg and Tom Steyer in the 2020 Democratic primary would have artificially inflated our calculations and it was excluded. Additionally, approximately $500 million was spent after the general election in 2020, specifically on the two Georgia runoff races that were held in early January 2021. We do not expect a similar situation to happen this year and therefore we removed that spending from our calculation of what we expect to be spent going forward.
The Democrats are working hard to manipulate Alaska’s controversial ranked-choice voting system into helping them in Alaska’s congressional race, where Rep. Mary Peltola seems to be slipping from her first-place spot. The Democrats are on record now pushing messages to conservative male voters to only vote for the third-party candidate, John Wayne Howe.
In a piece of campaign deception, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee accidentally publicized the instructions to its operatives and supporters on how to defeat Republican Nick Begich, by tricking Republicans and conservative men. Here’s what the DCCC is advising its network of operatives and political groups:
“White men under the age of 60 without a college degree, who are either very likely to be Republican or slightly more likely to be Republican than Democrat, who are not pro-choice or registered Democrats, and who live in the Anchorage and Fairbanks media markets, including in South Central Alaska – need to see ads narrowly targeted to them on digital platforms like Meta, Twitter, YouTube, and programmatic CTV that:
“John Wayne Howe is a Fairbanks native who is running for Congress to keep Alaska for Alaskans and make sure the government does not interfere with Alaskans’ freedoms. Howe believes that man-made climate change is bad science, and that we need to rapidly expand oil production here in Alaska for Alaskans. He will always stand for the Second Amendment and opposes any restrictions on the right to bear arms.”
That is the message that Alaska men will be inundated with for the next three weeks leading up to Election Day in order to trick those the age of 60 who do not have a college degree into not voting for Begich, who has the endorsement of the Alaska Outdoor Council and Gun Owners of America, the governor of the state and even Donald Trump.
The DCCC says directly to not rank: “It is important that people who vote for John Wayne Howe rank him first and do not consider other choices.”
In other words, the Democrats, who support ranked-choice voting, are telling Republicans to not rank anyone else but John Wayne Howe. The DCCC then has begged its allies to flood the airways with this communication message: “It is essential that voters hear more communication on YouTube from allies than from opponents.”
Those who mark Howe first and then abandon their ballots will see those ballots tossed after the first round of counting. In the primary, Howe received 1/2 percent of the vote. The Democrats think that 1/2 percent is their path to victory for Mary Peltola.
Vice President Kamala Harris in 2021 slammed Italian explorer Christopher Columbus and other Europeans for acts against the people living in the Americas when Christopher Columbus first arrived.
European explorers like Columbus, who was an Italian-Jew, “ushered in a wave of devastation, violence, stealing land, and widespread disease” she said.
Harris expanded on her Italophobic and anti-Semitic theories to the National Congress of American Indians, one day after Columbus Day, which the Biden Administration has renamed Indigenous Peoples Day.
She said that Italians spread diseases and implied that they did so intentionally.
“Since 1934, every October the United States has recognized the voyage of the European explorers who first landed on the shores of the Americas,” she said. “But that is not the whole story. That has never been the whole story.”
Then she went in for the kill shot against Jewish and European immigrants: “Those explorers ushered in a wave of devastation for tribal nations — perpetrating violence, stealing land, and spreading disease,” she said. She went on to talk about how the Covid virus was unfair to indigenous people, whose lives she labeled a “plight.”
Harris ignored the fact that pre-contact indigenous people in the Americas had short lifespans, conducted wars, took slaves, and went through many eras of hardship before Europeans ever arrived and took over the land.
Although the data is not definitive, the average lifespan of a Native American in the year 1500 was between 25 and 35 years. Rarely did American hunter-gatherers live past the age of 50. In 1500 the lifespan of Italians was 69.
Kamala Harris on Columbus Day:
"European explorers ushered in a wave of devastation, violence, stealing land, and widespread disease" pic.twitter.com/3XijDf5Ldo
According to the National Indian Council on Aging, American Indian and Alaska Native individuals have the lowest life expectancy, at about 72 years, when compared with other races and ethnicities. In 2022, life expectancy was 78.8 years, on average, for white people, 74.8 years for black people, and 81.9 years for Hispanics.
That means that Native Americans now have twice the lifespan they had before contact with Europeans.
“Native Americans are more likely to live in poverty, to be unemployed, and often struggle to get quality health care and to find affordable housing,” Harris said in 2021.
What are Native Americans dying from? According to the Indian Health Service, “American Indians and Alaska Natives continue to die at higher rates than other Americans in many categories, including chronic liver disease and cirrhosis, diabetes mellitus, unintentional injuries, assault/homicide, intentional self-harm/suicide, and chronic lower respiratory diseases.” The leading cause of chronic lower respiratory disease is smoking.
On Monday, the U.S. Department of Defense continued the insult against Italian heritage and history in the Americas by highlighting the day only as Indigenous People’s Day, and ignoring Columbus Day altogether, as it seeks to distance itself from the official holiday that has been celebrated in America since 1792.
“Today, we honor and celebrate the rich cultures, histories and contributions of the Indigenous communities around the world. Together, we can learn, support and uplift Indigenous voices as we work towards a more inclusive future,” The Department of Defense wrote on Twitter/X.
Columbus Day was first celebrated in the United States on Oct. 12, 1792, on the 300th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s landing in America. The first official Columbus Day holiday was established in 1892 by President Benjamin Harrison to mark the 400th anniversary. Then, in response to the lynching of 11 Italian Americans in New Orleans in 1891, President Franklin D. Roosevelt made Columbus Day an annual holiday. The Biden-Harris Administration is working hard to undo the work of President Harrison and FDR.
Former Republican Chairwoman Ann Brown, as the immediate past chair of the party, is still a voting officer of the party and thus must abide by party rules when it comes to using her title in endorsements.
A complaint has been filed inside the party because Brown, although free to endorse any candidate she wants as a citizen or even as a member of the party, cannot use her official Republican Party title or position in an endorsement for a candidate who is not also supported by the party. She violated party rules.
“Ann Brown has violated our party rules specifically: Article I – Purpose and Policy, Section 3: Support of Candidates (a) All Republicans have the right as individuals to support the candidates of their choice, provided that they may not use any official ARP position or resources for the support of candidates not endorsed by a district, the SCC or an affiliate,” the complaint explained.
On Sept. 12, Brown co-wrote a column in support of Sen. Kelly Merrick that was published in the Anchorage Daily News.
“In this letter, Ann Brown used her current official title with the Alaska Republican Party to sign the letter. ‘Ann Brown is a retired attorney. She currently serves as the immediate past chair of the Alaska Republican Party,'” the complaint to Party Chairwoman Carmela Warfield said.
The letter to the editor was then used in a campaign mailer for Merrick; once again Ann Brown’s name was listed as the immediate past chair endorsing Merrick.
Merrick has not been endorsed by the State Central Committee. Even Gov. Mike Dunleavy has endorsed her opponent, Jared Goecker, also a Republican.
“Members of the SCC are not allowed to use their titles to promote a candidate that doesn’t have the endorsement of the State Party. Chugiak-Eagle River has made a different choice in supporting Jared Goecker. Both districts have voted to endorse, and representatives from these districts have promoted his candidacy to the SCC, where the State Party unanimously endorsed him,” the complaint said.
Brown is strongly connected to Big Labor political leaders; both she and Merrick are married to people who are essentially on union payrolls. Merrick is married to Laborers’ Local 341 Business Manager Joey Merrick and Brown is married to a lawyer who specializes in union health care plans.
Donald Handeland, the regional representative for the Republican Region 3, said it is “very disheartening to see a former chair and current member of the SCC promoting a candidate who has not been endorsed by the party over one who has the support of the districts and the State Party. As a former chair, Ann Brown should be setting a positive example for our party. However, her actions have been disappointing and have undermined our party’s integrity.”
Handeland called for Brown to resign or suggested a vote should be taken on whether to remove her from her position as past chair in the party, thus removing her as a voting member of the State Central Committee. And he asked Party Chairwoman Carmela Warfield to also find ways to minimize the impact of the letter in the Chugiak-Eagle River election for Senate Seat L.
Last week, Merrick had a complaint filed against her by members of her own party, who said her campaign had accepted illegal donations from a private business. That complaint was filed with the Alaska Public Offices Commission.
It happened in 2023 during an amendment process on a bill: Alaska Rep. Mary Peltola voted against the amendment, which was offered by Republican Rep.Thomas Massie to reverse earlier Biden Administration legislation that mandates that all new cars must have kill switches installed on them, which the government could then use to kill the engine remotely.
House Republicans in 2023 tried to take out the “kill switch” mandate, which theoretically allows an agency or person located anywhere on the planet to take control of your vehicle. The House failed that day to pass Massie’s amendment to defund that piece of the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Peltola voted with the Democrats.
According to the new Biden Administration mandates, new cars will to be able to listen to in-car noises and conversations, monitor drivers’ eyes, check the air in the car for alcohol fumes, and have kill switches that will automatically shut your car off if the computer — or someone controlling the computer — thinks you should not drive.
Privacy advocates express concern that the technology may not be good enough to know when to legitimately shut off a car after the computer determines the driver is impaired.
Another question is: What is someone is injured or sick and is trying to get to a doctor or hospital, but the computer decides the person should not drive?
Further concerns relate to computers connected to the internet that could be hacked and operated remotely by nefarious persons.
Although Massie’s amendment didn’t pass, it’s not over. U.S. Congressmen Scott Perry of Pennsylvania has sponsored H.R. 6563, the No Kill Switches in Cars Act, which would similarly repeal the kill switch mandate.
Most registered voters, 59%, support a federal ban on transgender procedures such as puberty blockers and gender reassignment surgeries for minors, a new national poll found.
According to the poll, although both sexes favored a federal ban on transgender procedures for minors, men were more likely to favor it, with 63% in favor compared to 56% for women.
Among the ethnicities polled, “others” favored a ban the most at 63% compared to 61% for whites. Of black registered voters polled, 46% favored a ban, while 32% were opposed and 22% were not sure.
Among age demographics, the categories most in favor of a federal ban were 45-54 and 54-65, both of which polled at 61%, while 18-34 were the least in favor, albeit still at a 52% majority of them still supporting banning the procedures for minors.
Although voters with and without college degrees both favored a federal ban by more than 50%, those without degrees favored it more at 61%, while 55% of voters with a college degree supported a ban.
Voters with children supported a ban more than those without, at 61% to 52% respectively.
Geographically, rural voters favored a ban more than suburban or urban voters, at 64% compared to 57% and 58% respectively.
Regionally, the Northeast was least supportive of a federal ban, with 51% in favor. The South was the most supportive at 61%, while the Midwest favored it at 60%. Voters in the West favored a ban by 59%.
Transgender procedures on minors are now banned in 25 states, including states such as Ohio which, according to data from the nonprofit Do No Harm, was one of the top in the nation for procedures and procedures per capita. According to Do No Harm’s data, released last week, at least 13,994 transgender procedures were performed on minors across the U.S. between 2019-2023, The Center Square reported.
Do No Harm is a nonprofit group of physicians and other medical professionals that gets its name from the Hippocratic oath: “First, do no harm.” According to its website, Do No Harm is “fighting to curtail the unscientific and individually harmful practice of so-called ‘gender affirming care'” for children.
In an email to The Center Square, David Byler with Noble Predictive Insights, wrote that “on many issues surrounding trans rights and students or youth, the GOP has public opinion on their side. There’s a reason that, when you look at GOP ads, they are constantly hammering this and other related issues. And some prominent Democrats are pushing out moderate, rather than left, messages.”
He added that “Republicans know that trans issues are a strong social issue for them – and after getting hit hard on abortion so many times since Dobbs, they want to make sure they’re pushing back and finding social issues that work for them.”
