The Daily Signal - $800 Billion Defense Spending Approved by House, Lawmakers Condemn Harvard, Higher Ed on Antisemitism | Dec. 14

Episode Date: December 14, 2023

TOP NEWS | On today’s Daily Signal Top News, we break down: The House passes the annual NDAA. McConnell blasts Harvard’s Gay, condemns “moral rot” in universities. House officially condemns university presidents’ antisemitism testimony. Teacher’s lawsuit on pronouns moves forward. Boston Mayor defends holiday party invitation that excludes whites. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm Virginia Allen, and this is the daily signal top news for Thursday, December 14. Here are today's headlines. The House of Representatives passed the annual National Defense Authorization Act today, also known as the NDAA. The legislation includes $886 billion in spending and now heads to President Joe Biden's death for a signature. The vote was 310 to 118, 45 Democrats, and 73. Republicans opposed the bill. That's according to reporting from the Hill. The legislation was opposed by many conservatives in the House and Senate who have argued that it upholds many far-left social priorities and other policies that violate the rights of American citizens. Representative Chip

Roy, Republican of Texas, criticized the bill in a House floor speech. Take a listen. Gentleman from Texas is recognized for closing. We have come to the floor today. on a bill that all of us want to see past. Every single one of us want to pass a National Defense Authorization Act. Every single one of us wants to ensure that our men and women in uniform are paid appropriately, have the tools they need to carry out their job, have the care when they get home, and that we do our job. Every single one of us wants to make sure that we do that.

But we are doing a terrible disservice to the people of this. country by piling on an extension of a FISA regime that was abused, notably clearly abused, against American citizens without reforming that piece of legislation, by kicking the can down the road, by extending it not just through April, but through April of 2025. A vote for this bill is not just a bill for pay raises and support for our men and women in uniform. A vote for this bill is a perpetuation of the woke policies undermining our military, breaking down morale, driving down recruiting, and now undermining the civil liberties of the American people by not reforming FISA. So while Chip Roy is obviously very critical of the bill, the Biden administration has praised its passage.

Reuters reported that the White House said the NDAA provides the critical authority. we need to build the military required to deter future conflicts while supporting the service members and their spouses and families who carry out that mission every day. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell blasted Harvard today over their decision to retain President Claudian Gay, and he criticized higher education in general for its equivocation on anti-Semitism. In a floor speech, the Kentucky Republican pointed to numerous cases where something was rotten in the state of America's most elite universities. According to McConnell, despite her abysmal record on combating anti-Semitism and mounting allegations of plagiarism

in her own scholarship, the cadre of left-wing financiers and university administrators who make up the governing Harvard Corporation has affirmed their confidence that President Gay is the right leader to help our community heal. McConnell noted that Ivy League schools have bent over backwards to placate anti-Semites promoting genocide on campus. They've done a deplorable job protecting speech for those who question left-wing ideas. Take a listen via Forbes breaking news. Today's elite college campuses are hardly bastions. of free speech. The Ivy League's enforcement of speech restrictions against the laundry list of wrong think and microaggressions would make sensors in Pyongyang blush. The House passed a resolution

on Wednesday night condemning the presidents of Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for their House anti-Semitism hearing testimony. The House voted 303 to 126, according to the Washington Examiner. The vote condemned the rise of anti-Semitism on college campuses. The resolution received bipartisan support, though most Democrats did vote against it, citing that it was symbolic and didn't do enough. Representative Jerry Nadler is a New York Democrat who voted against the resolution and said that while he was appalled by the answers from the college presidents, he thought it

was a gross overreach for lawmakers to meddle in the hiring and firing of college presidents. Supporters of the bill had a different take. The examiner reports that House GOP chairwoman and New York Republican representative, Elise Stefonic, said this is not a partisan issue, but a question of moral clarity, which is why our colleagues from across the aisle have come together. The University of Pennsylvania's president, Elizabeth McGill, resigned from her position, following her testimony on Capitol Hill and pressure from the school. The Virginia Supreme Court today blocked the lawsuit of a high school teacher who said he was fired

for refusing to use a student's preferred pronouns. Peter Vlamming is a French teacher at West Point High School in West Point, Virginia, and was fired in 2018 for using female pronouns to address a female student who said her identity was male. We've actually had Peter Vleming on this show and been privileged to do a documentary with him at The Daily Signal. You can find all of that on our website. Vleming said that he was willing to use the student's chosen name but not chosen pronouns. Fleming said in a 22 interview with the Daily Signal that he was essentially given the option to either deny his own Christian beliefs in order to stay in the school system or stand and fight.

According to Alliance Defending Freedom, which is the legal firm that represents Fleming, they said Peter went out of his way to accommodate this student as he does all his students. His school fired him because he wouldn't contradict his core beliefs. That is according to Caleb Dalton of Alliance Defending Freedom. The teacher's $1 million lawsuit against the school had been dismissed by a circuit court. Boston's Democrat mayor is defending hosting a holiday party. party that had an invitation excluding white people. Mayor Michelle Wu's office sent out a holiday party email invitation on Wednesday to city council members titled Elections of Color holiday party.

Seven members of the council are white and they reportedly accidentally received the invite. According to Fox News, Wu told reporters on Wednesday that the invitation was not meant to be sent to white council members. Their invitations were rescinded about 15 minutes after the the original email was sent. Wu called it an honest mistake in a message to reporters, according to the New York Post. I think we've had individual conversations with everyone so people understand that it was truly just an honest mistake that went out in typing the email field. And I look forward to celebrating with everyone at the holiday parties that we will have besides this one as well.

So it is my intention that we can, again, be a city that lives our values. create space for all kinds of communities to come together. The party name did receive criticism on social media. Conservative writer Stephen L. Miller posted on X. The mayor of Boston planned a colored only Christmas party and then just went oopsie over it. That's going to do it for today's episode. Thanks for being with us here on the Daily Signal's top news. If you haven't had a chance, make sure that you check out our morning show right here in this

same podcast feed. Tomorrow morning, I'm going to be sitting down with Chris Sincolns. in Acola. He's the Director of Communications and Media Relations at the Pioneer Institute. We talk about the crisis in civics and history education in our school system and a solution that the Pioneer Institute has put forward to solve that crisis. I also take a minute to subscribe to the Daily Signal wherever you like to listen. And if you would, leave us a five-star rating and review. Thanks again for being with us today. Have a wonderful night. We'll see you right back here tomorrow morning.

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