The Daily Signal - Third Speaker Nominee Drops Out of Race, Hamas Releases Hostages, Former Trump Attorney Pleads Guilty | Oct. 24

Episode Date: October 24, 2023

TOP NEWS | On today’s Daily Signal Top News, we break down: Congressman Tom Emmer of Minnesota won the House speaker nomination and then dropped out of the race only a few hours later.  Former Trump Attorney Jenna Ellis pleads guilty to charges in the Georgia election interference case. Hamas releases two elderly women on health grounds.  Secretary of State Antony Blinken sends a clear message to Iran.  Relevant Links Listen to other podcasts from The Daily Signal: https://www.dailysignal.com/podcasts/ Get daily conservative news you can trust from our Morning Bell newsletter: DailySignal.com/morningbellsubscription   Listen to more Heritage podcasts: https://www.heritage.org/podcasts Sign up for The Agenda newsletter — the lowdown on top issues conservatives need to know about each week: https://www.heritage.org/agenda 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 DailySkinnel Top News for Tuesday, October 24th. Here are today's headlines. Congressman Tom Emmer won the nomination for the House Speaker earlier today, and then a few hours later announced that he was dropping out of the race. Emmer dropped out after several Republicans said that they would not support him as Speaker, indicating that he wouldn't have enough support to actually win a vote for House Speaker on the floor of the House. Emmer currently serves as the majority whip in the house. Former President Donald Trump was critical of Emmer recently.

He wrote on social media, I have many wonderful friends wanting to be Speaker of the House and some are truly great warriors. Rhino Tom Emmer, who I do not know well, is not one of them. It's worth noting that Emmer voted to certify the 2020 presidential election. But now Republicans look like they're going to have to be back behind closed doors for meetings to decide who that next speaker nominee will be. The other candidates who ran against Emmer and who may now try again to win that nomination include Jack Bergman of Michigan, Byron Donalds of Florida, Kevin Hearn of Oklahoma, Mike Johnson

of Louisiana, Austin Scott of Georgia, and Pete Sessions of Texas. Emmer is the third speaker nominee to drop out of the race, Steve Sclease, and then Jim Jordan, of course, both initially received that nomination, but didn't have enough support on the floor of the House to actually win the gavel. So we're going to continue following this closely here at the Daily Signal, so stay tuned. Former Trump attorney Jenna Ellis pled guilty earlier today to charges in the Georgia election interference case. Specifically, Ellis pled guilty to one count of aiding and abetting false statements in

relation to claims of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election. Ellis is the fourth defendant named in the case to plead guilty. Ellis read a statement after entering her guilty plea, and she choked back tears while apologizing to the people of Georgia per Forbes. What I did not do but should have done, Your Honor, was to make sure that the facts the other lawyers alleged to be true were in fact true. In the frenetic pace of attempting to raise challenges to the election in several states, including Georgia, I failed to do my due diligence. I believe in and I value election integrity. If I knew then what I know now, I would have declined to represent Donald Trump in these post-election challenges. I look back on this whole experience with deep remorse.

For those failures of mine, Your Honor, I have taken responsibility already before the Colorado bar who censured me, and I now take responsibility before this court and apologize to the people of Georgia. Thank you. Ellis has been sentenced to five years of probation and is required to pay $5,000 in restitution. Former Trump attorneys Sidney Powell and Kenneth Chesbrough have also pled guilty in the case, as has Scott Hall. Trump and the other 14 defendants have pled not guilty. Now let's take a moment to turn to Israel, where the military there is continuing airstrikes on Gaza in efforts to

eliminate Hamas. The Israel Defense Force wrote on X this morning that they had struck over 400 terrorist targets in the past 24 hours in efforts to dismantle Hamas terrorist capabilities. Israel Defense Force Chief of the General Staff, Hetzie Halevi, says the military is seeking to dismantle Hamas. We want to bring Hamas to a makeon of puruk. Here, the in the in-hacka-shelho, this is the military-shawe's of its work. Here, the Israel Defense Force Chief says, we want to bring Hamas to a state of full dismantling, its leaders, its military branch,

and its working mechanisms. We reported yesterday that Hamas had released two of the over 200 hostages that they took captive, and we've learned that two more were also freed. yesterday. Hamas released the two elderly women on health grounds. Hamas fighters delivered them to red crossworkers who then transported them to Israel. The two latest hostages released are 85-year-old Yakvad Lifshitz and 79-year-old Nereid Cooper. Lifshitz described the over two weeks that she spent as a hostage as a hell. She spoke at a press conference with her daughter translating for her and said she was hit with sticks when she was captured by Hamas and described

being taken into a network of Hamas tunnels per the New York Post. There are a huge network of tunnels underneath. It looks like a spider web. Here at the Heritage Foundation, we were honored to host an event yesterday, celebrating Israel's 75 years as a nation, and discussing the few. of the U.S. Israel Alliance. Iowa Republican Congresswoman Joni Ernst spoke at the event, and she accused Iran of contributing to Hamas' attack on Israel. Ernst noted that the Biden administration has tried to reach a nuclear agreement with Iran. Ernst was critical, the Biden administration and accused Biden of seeking to appease Iran.

What we have seen with this administration is an administration of appeasement. They will do whatever they can, not to get on the bad side of an authoritarian regime, not to get on the bad side of terrorists, heaven forbid. Ernst was in the Middle East when Hamas launched its attack on Israel, and she went to Israel on October 10th, just three days after that initial attack. The message that Ernst brought back to Washington, D.C., was not only do we need to continue to fund the defense of Israel, but also we need to push much harder against Iran as well, because a lot of this is stemming directly out of Iran, according to Senator Ernst.

Secretary of State Anthony Blinken spoke today to the 15 U.S. member security council. He said the United States does not seek conflict with Iran. We do not want this war to widen. But Blinken said if Iran or its proxies attack U.S. personnel anywhere, make no mistake. We will defend our people. We will defend our security swiftly and decisively. With that, that is going to do it for today's episode of the Daily Signal's top news. Thanks for being with us today. Join us tomorrow morning for the Daily Signal interview edition. I'm going to be sitting down with Texas Land Commissioner Don Buckingham. To get into some details about what is happening at the

southern border and specifically security concerns over who is crossing our southern border and whether we have a terrorist threat on the border. Also make sure to subscribe to The Daily Signal wherever you get your podcast and help us reach more listeners by taking a moment to leave a five-star rating and review. Thanks again for being with us today. We'll see you right back here tomorrow morning.

The Daily Signal podcast is brought to you by more than half a million members of the Heritage Foundation. Executive producers are Rob, Louie, and Kate Trinko. Producers are Virginia Allen and Samantha Asheras. Sound designed by Lauren Evans, Mark Geinney, and John Pop. To learn more, please visit DailySignal.com.