A terrifying new street drug is sweeping through America. It’s gruesomely eating away at addict’s flesh. This dangerous substance is an animal tranquilizer called Xylazine, better known as Tranq. But it gets worse, Fentanyl, which is already responsible for deaths of tens of thousands of young Americans is now being mixed with Tranq.
Philadelphia has become ground zero for this destructive drug trend, but it’s spreading. Board certified neurologist, Dr. Russell Surasky joins OAN’s Alicia Summers to discuss the growing problem.

Five senior officials have disclosed that local, state, and federal law enforcement and security agencies are getting ready for a potential indictment of former President Donald Trump as soon as next week. The agencies are in talks about potential security measures for the Manhattan Criminal Court and its surroundings, should Trump be charged in relation to a supposed hush money payment made to Stormy Daniels.

The magnitude of agencies involved includes the NYPD, New York State Court Officers, the U.S. Secret Service, the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, and the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. The scale of preparation highlights the gravity of the situation and the chaotic impact that an indictment could have on Trump’s 2024 campaign and legal future.

Webmaster addition: Oh look, a repeat of Jan 6!

Officials in Maricopa County, Arizona, announced on Friday that they would conduct an investigation into widespread reports of problems with printers during the contested November election following complaints from scores of voters and legal action from former GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake.

Former Arizona Supreme Court Justice Ruth McGregor said she would lead the “independent” probe, according to county officials. The former justice was a member of the state’s highest court from 1998 to 2009 and took part in the 2019 investigation into security issues involving Arizona prisons.

McGregor plans to hire a team of “independent experts to find out why the printers that read ballots well in the August Primary had trouble reading some ballots while using the same settings in the November General,” Maricopa Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates and Vice Chairman Clint Hickman noted in the statement. “Our voters deserve nothing less.”

Russia has threatened to destroy any fighter jets given to Ukraine by its allies, after two countries promised planes.

Slovakia became the second Nato country to pledge Kyiv some MiG-29 aircraft on Friday, a day after Poland.

Slovakia's fleet was grounded last year and it no longer uses the jets.

Ukraine has asked Western countries for modern jets, but because of long training times, these are seen only as long-term options.

It sees extra aircraft as important for its defences and possible counter-attacks, a year into Russia's invasion.

Other Nato countries are considering sending planes such as the MiG-29 - a model which dates from the time of the Soviet Union - which Ukrainian pilots are trained to fly.

The Washington Senate Law & Justice Committee is scheduled to vote on House Bill 1240 next week, which seeks to establish a state definition of “assault weapon” that could be applied to most firearms, according to the Gun Owners of America (GOA).

The proposed law aims to prohibit the manufacture, distribution, and sale of assault weapons, with exemptions for licensed firearm manufacturers and dealers for sale to law enforcement agencies and armed forces branches, sale or transfer outside the state, and inheritors.

The National Rifle Association (NRA) released a statement encouraging its members and Second Amendment supporters to oppose the bill, which it describes as a comprehensive ban on the future transferring, importing, and manufacturing of many semi-automatic firearms commonly used for self-defense, competition, and recreation.

The Manhattan District Attorney's office has asked for a meeting with law enforcement ahead of a possible indictment of former President Donald Trump next week, according to a court source.

According to the source, the meeting was requested Thursday and hasn't been set. The meeting is to "discuss logistics for some time next week, which would mean that they are anticipating an indictment next week," the source familiar with the planning said.

The source of the early reports from an "international team" of virologists is The Atlantic, which lays out from the onset the familiar narrative that the wet market near the Wuhan Institute of Virology must have been the natural source of the novel coronavirus.

"This week, an international team of virologists, genomicists, and evolutionary biologists may have finally found crucial data to help fill that knowledge gap," the Atlantic claimed. "A new analysis of genetic sequences collected from the market shows that raccoon dogs being illegally sold at the venue could have been carrying and possibly shedding the virus at the end of 2019. It’s some of the strongest support yet, experts told me, that the pandemic began when SARS-CoV-2 hopped from animals into humans, rather than in an accident among scientists experimenting with viruses."

House Committee on Oversight and Accountability Chairman Rep. James Comer, a Republican from Kentucky, is requesting a transcribed interview with Biden family business associate Rob Walker, the Daily Caller has learned.

A memo released by the Oversight Committee on Thursday revealed that Biden family members received over $1.3 million in payments from accounts linked to Rob Walker.

“The Committee on Oversight and Accountability is investigating President Biden’s involvement in his family’s business practices. The Committee has identified you as a critical witness in this matter and has reviewed evidence showing you received millions of dollars originating from a Chinese energy company and elsewhere. The Committee invites you to participate in a transcribed interview with Committee staff,” the letter says.

At its 2023 Investor Day presentation in Texas, Tesla revealed its plans to produce its next generation EV motor without any rare earth minerals. As a global leader in the electric vehicle market, Tesla’s plan for zero rare earth permanent magnet motors, if successful, could have a significant impact on the rare earth market—particularly China’s rare earth monopoly.

“As the world transitions to clean energy, the demand for rare earths is really increasing dramatically, and not only will it be a little harder to meet that demand, but mining rare earths has environmental and health risks,” said Colin Campbell, VP of Powertrain Engineering at Tesla.

“We have designed our next drive unit, which uses a permanent magnet motor, to not use any rare earth materials at all,” he announced.

We knew this was the endgame more than two weeks ago when we reported that “Credit Suisse Crashes To All Time Low After Boosting Deposit Rates To Reverse Bank Run” in which we reported that after a quarter of “staggering” bank runs, the second largest Swiss bank – clearly panicking – was offering a 6.5% annual rate on new three-month deposits of $5 million or above – and a rate as high as 7% for one-year deposits – far above matched maturity Bills, and suggesting that to attract a client, the bank is forced to eat a loss.

The hope, we explained, “was that after it attracts enough new clients, the bank will then be able to quietly lower the rates and make the new accounts profitable, however as the various DeFi blow ups of 2022 showed, it never quite works out that way.”

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator Michael Regan said on Friday that he expects the cleanup in East Palestine, Ohio, to take three months.

“We are absolutely laser focused on ensuring that Norfolk Southern cleans up this mess as quickly as possible. We are optimistic that the cleanup will be complete in three months,” Regan said during a conference call on Friday.

“We will continue to be transparent. We will continue to ensure that the people of East Palestine get the protection that they deserve and that Norfolk Southern will be held accountable,” the EPA administrator added.

Webmaster addition: The clean-up will take a lot longer than that! Especially with the latest dioxin numbers!

House Oversight Committee Republicans are seeking to bring in Hunter Biden associate John R. Walker for questioning after poring over years' worth of his bank records and uncovering a $35,000 payment to Hallie Biden, Beau Biden's widow.

Panel chair Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) released a letter Thursday with new details on the $3 million payment that Walker received from a Chinese firm, after issuing a subpoena to Bank of America for his financial records. 

The information provided by Comer stated that Walker received a $3 million wire transfer from Chinese State Energy HK Limited, a firm affiliated with CEFC China Energy, then distributed $1.3 million to accounts associated with Biden family members.

Update (1345ET): At least four major banks including Societe Generale and Deutsche Bank have placed restrictions on their trades involving Credit Suisse or its securities, Reuters reports, citing five unidentified people with direct knowledge of the matter.

Another source at a major global bank, who deals directly with Credit Suisse in Asia, said their bank had started asking the Swiss lender to gross settle, a trading scenario where the counterparty demands upfront payment from Credit Suisse instead of collecting later any money the Swiss lender might owe them as a result of the trade.

Another global bank has reduced its unsecured exposure to Credit Suisse, which includes all lending with no collateral, according to a person with knowledge of the matter. The bank is still providing repurchase agreements, which is secured lending.

Webmaster addition: Credit Suisse's stock price continues its plunge.

French President Emmanuel Macron used special constitutional powers to pass a controversial pension bill through the National Assembly (the lower house) without a vote, a move likely to ignite protests on the streets of Paris.

The New York Times reported that Macron's government used Article 49.3 of the Constitution to push through the pension reform bill without a parliamentary vote, highlighting the unpopularity of the proposed increase in retirement age by two years to 64.

AFP said there was chaos in the parliament and even outside after the government invoked 49.3:

Lawmakers were shouting, their voices shaking with emotion as Macron made the risky move, which is expected to trigger quick motions of no-confidence in his government. Riot police vans zoomed by outside the National Assembly, their sirens wailing.

Macron's government has emphasized the need for pension reforms to ensure the sustainability of the pension system for the next ten years, as it is projected to have an annual deficit of 10 billion euros ($10.73 billion) from 2022 to 2032.

The Twitter Files document how classic communist repression of freedom of speech now is the commonplace strategy in the United States.

Journalist and bestselling author, Matt Taibbi’ presentation at the “Hearing on the Weaponization of the Federal Government on the Twitter Files” for the House Judiciary Committee, is but another example of the horrifying level of centralized censorship that engulfs America.

Lankford then noted that it has been reported that many Chinese funds and startups, including those with ties to the CCP, had invested with SVB.

"Will my banks in Oklahoma pay a special assessment to be able to make Chinese investors whole from Silicon Valley Bank?" Lankford asked, to which Yellen replied, "I suppose that could include foreign depositors."

"I don’t believe there’s any legal basis to discriminate among uninsured," she continued.

• The Federal government is actively trying to take away what little power states have left in their own elections. According to Just The News, the Department of Homeland Security wants to have more power in how local elections are handled by quietly using an unknown non-profit called the Center for Internet Security Agency (CIS).
• The trend started when the CIS suddenly popped up in county elections all across the country offering vague "cybersecurity services" to allegedly protect against cyberattacks. Nobody's stopping this group from taking over. In fact, this group is being welcomed with open arms.
• What most people probably don't know is that the CIS has been embroiled in countless censorship scandals targeting information that they deem goes against the swamp's official narrative. They have a history of censoring information from the public.
• Not only is the CIS a censorship tool for the state, but DHS has previously confirmed that they are in a "cooperative agreement" with the CIS directly. In other words, the CIS is controlled by the DHS, which is controlled directly by the Biden administration.

Matt Taibbi has unearthed still more evidence of collusion and censorship at Twitter, all done by people and institutions who believed that they were righteous in their efforts to ban and block Americans from telling the truth about their own personal experiences with the Covid vaccine. This time, it's Stanford University and their Virality Project that told officials what information should be banned.

Taibbi reports that Stanford's Virality Project took issue with accounts that used factual information to question the "expert guidance" of Dr. Anthony Fauci, former head of the NIAID. He notes that accounts that questioned the "Wuhan wet market" origin story of Covid, instead suggesting that the virus could have leaked from a Wuhan Virology Lab, were suspect per Stanford. That "lab leak" theory is now the primary Covid-origin theory per officials.

Prior to its implosion, Signature Bank of New York was busy indoctrinating its employees into the world of LGBT pronouns like “ze” and “hir,” it has been revealed.

Chairman Scott Shay co-hosted a company event just last fall called “Know Your Pronouns” in which lower-level employees were browbeaten into adopting the use of made-up gender pronouns that affirm the delusions of the mentally ill – instead of learning how to properly run a bank so it avoids a collapse.

Video footage of the seminar, which up until today was publicly available on the Signature Bank YouTube page before it was taken private, depicted employees dressed up in tar-and-feather costumes dancing around to “woke” tunes and lyrics, presumably inspired by Shay and his ilk.

Along with Finn Brigham, a Manhattan-based corporate consulate on gender issues, Shay forced Signature Bank employees to participate in a so-called “Social Impact” series that proudly featured as its header the claim that Signature Bank was “the first bank in the United States to have an openly gay man on our board.”

Newly released data shows soil in the Ohio town of East Palestine – scene of a recent catastrophic train crash and chemical spill – contains dioxin levels hundreds of times greater than the exposure threshold above which Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scientists in 2010 found poses cancer risks.

The EPA at the time proposed lowering the cleanup threshold to reflect the science around the highly toxic chemical, but the Obama administration killed the rules, and the higher federal action threshold remains in place.

Though the dioxin levels in East Palestine are below the federal action threshold and an EPA administrator last week told Congress the levels were “very low”, chemical experts, including former EPA officials, who reviewed the data for the Guardian called them “concerning”.

Rioters threatened the home of French president Emmanuel Macron after he bypassed parliament to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64.

Thousands took to the streets across France last night to express their fury at the move, setting fires to property and fighting the police.

The demonstrations in Paris, Lyon, Marseille and Nantes were triggered by Macron's government using a controversial constitutional mechanism to crash a bill through the National Assembly.

There is a strong signal that irregularities happened intentionally to change the results of the latest AZ election between Republican Kari Lake and Democrat Katie Hobbs. On Friday morning, one top pollster reported to Steve Bannon on the War Room that he feels very confident, based on new polling, that Lake won her race by a massive lead of 8 points.

“We asked questions about who did you vote for in the most recent midterm elections, and we asked about Governor, Secretary of State Attorney General government,” Mark Mitchell of Rasmussen, told Bannon about the way the polling happened, adding:

“We used our standard method, and we used very uncontroversial weightings. They’re slightly more favorable to Democrats by two points than the Edison numbers that came out, which is what everybody uses, you know, the gold standard in the industry for exit polling. And so we found that just four months ago, the people of AZ elected Kari Lake as governor of Arizona by eight points.” 

 “That is a landslide,” Bannon replied, inviting Kari Lake into the conversation. “We thank whoever sponsored this poll.”

‘My thoughts are that the red wave did happen, and this poll verifies that point. And it shows that people understand that elections are corrupt and people care about these issues. For example, 50% believe that 2020 elections were rigged, and 55% believe that 2022 was rigged,” Lake told Bannon when she joined in on the segment.