(breitbart) – A senior Iranian military commander warned Sunday that U.S. Air Force B-52 bombers in the Persian Gulf will meet a “crushing and fiery response” if they dare to venture near Iran airspace.

Deputy Commander of Khatam al-Anbia Air Defense Base, Brigadier General Qader Rahimzadeh, said the “smallest potential violation of Iran’s airspace” would trigger the response, according to the semi-official Tasnim news service.

“The country’s airspace is among our redlines and, as enemies have experienced in the past too, the smallest violation will be met with the (Iranian) air defense forces’ crushing and fiery response,” the Iranian commander said.

As Breitbart News reported, a pair of U.S. B-52H Stratofortresses flew a show-of-force mission across the Persian Gulf on Thursday in a display intended to deter attacks from Iran.

The New York Times says the bombers flew over the Middle East alongside aircraft from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain. These were likely fighter jets, as all three countries maintain sizable inventories of American fighters, particularly F-15 Eagle and F-16 Fighting Falcon fighters.

The B-52H bomber has a range of 8,800 miles, and the return trip itself was about 17,000 miles. That means the two bombers would have had to refuel at least three times during the trip, though four times is more likely due to the crossing of the Atlantic.

The aircraft, assigned to Louisiana’s Barksdale Air Force Base-headquartered 2nd Bomb Wing, flew the short-notice nonstop mission the military said was “designed to deter aggression” and assure allies and partners the United States can rapidly deploy military power.

Rahimzadeh said Iran’s integrated air defense monitors the movements of manned and unmanned aircraft around the country meant the B-52s would stand no chance against the bravery of the Islamic republic’s soldiers and weaponary.

“The air defense analyzes these movements, and devises and implements proportional plans after learning about the enemies’ (potential) targets and behavior,” he added.

U.S. Air Force B-52 bombers were last ordered to the region 12 months ago to counter unspecified threats from Iran.

Officially nicknamed the Stratofortress and informally known as the Big Ugly Fat Fellow, the B-52 featured heavily in the air war over Vietnam.

breitbart.com/middle-east/2020/12/13/iran-warns-u-s-a-crushing-and-fiery-response-awaits-b-52-overflights/

(breitbart) – Vice President Mike Pence’s team has responded after the far-left Lincoln Project ran an advertisement that falsely claimed Pence has distanced himself from President Donald Trump because he knows “it’s over.”

In a statement to Breitbart News, Chief of Staff to the Vice President Marc Short said Pence “wakes up every day to stand with President Donald Trump” and slammed the Lincoln Project’s ad as a “baseless smear” from “Never Trumpers”:

Vice President Pence wakes up every day to stand with President Donald Trump and to keep their promises to Make America Great Again, including working to end the pandemic by delivering the coronavirus vaccine in record time. The Lincoln Project grifters wake up every day to advance the socialist agenda of [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi, [Senate Minority Leader] Chuck Schumer, and [Former Vice President] Joe Biden. The latest attack ad from the Lincoln Project is a disgrace and another baseless smear from a group of Never Trumpers who have opposed this administration from day one. It is ironic that a group of former Republicans are seeking to salvage their flailing careers by attacking Vice President Pence’s integrity and loyalty, all while scamming and swindling people out of their hard-earned money. Vice President Pence will continue to stand with President Trump to ensure every legal vote is counted and every illegal vote is thrown out.

The Lincoln Project’s advertisement appeared on YouTube, the tech giant that on Wednesday announced it would remove videos questioning a Biden victory as legal challenges continue.

“The end is coming, Donald. Even Mike Pence knows,” the narrator said. “He’s backing away from your train wreck, from your desperate lies, and clown lawyers. When Mike Pence is running away from you, you know it’s over. Trying to protect his reputation, protect his future.”

“There’s one last thing, Donald,” the narrator added. “On January 6, Mike Pence will put the nail in your political coffin when he presides over the Senate vote to prove Joe Biden won. It’s over and Mike Pence knows it.”

While there is no evidence to show that Pence knows “it’s over,” there is evidence that Pence has remained loyal to Trump in legal efforts and has traveled throughout, making stops in Georgia to support the Republican candidates in the Senate runoff elections scheduled for January 5.

A brief look back at Pence’s schedule of events shows that the vice president quickly began supporting Trump’s legal efforts as he held a strategy meeting at the campaign headquarters the day after Election Day.

Since December 4, Pence has had a tweet pinned to his account which vows “to keep fighting until every LEGAL vote is counted” and “every illegal vote is thrown out.”

On the Friday after Election Day, Pence hosted a fundraising call for legal efforts in support of Trump. At Trump’s request, Pence has also been keeping in touch with various stakeholders and lawmakers in battleground states.

On Thursday, Pence traveled to Georgia for the fourth time on behalf of Sens. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) and David Perdue (R-GA), both of whom will face off against their respective Democrat challengers Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff.

In addition to his stop in Georgia on Thursday, Pence will also travel to South Carolina, where he will tout the progress being made on the coronavirus vaccine under Trump’s leadership.

breitbart.com/politics/2020/12/10/pence-team-slams-fake-never-trump-lincoln-project-ad-disgrace/

(breitbart) – Breitbart News senior contributor Peter Schweizer said on Wednesday on Fox News Channel’s “Hannity” that the Hunter Biden federal investigation for his taxes gave prosecutors an “opportunity” to gain access to foreign bank accounts, foreign transactions so they can “start to unravel the full extent of the Biden relationship with the Chinese government.”

Partial transcript as follows:

HANNITY: Now, remember, Peter Schweizer, friend of this program, well, he broke right here on this program is great book, “Secret Empires” in 2018, the extent of Hunter’s dealings, exposing how Hunter Biden inked these sweetheart deals one after another despite no experience, no qualifications, all while profiting off of his father’s diplomacies overseas. And here to explain more and react to tonight’s breaking news is Peter Schweizer.

My sources say this investigation has actually been ongoing since 2018. It is a real investigation and he may now be the target of an investigation and the news was about to break on this one way or another and it was going to be exposed. Let me ask you first about China. He said in that “GMA” interview I never got a penny from China. Was he lying?

SCHWEIZER: Well, he didn’t get a penny from China. He got millions and millions of pennies from China. Yeah, he is absolutely lying. And the thing to keep in mind here, Sean, is there’s a multitude of deals with China. You’ve got the $1.5 billion private equity deal where he joins the board and he gets an equity stake. You’ve got Rosemont Realty in which a Chinese company called Gemini with links to the Chinese military comes in and buys that firm. Hunter is involved in that deal. We know about the CEFC activities.

Part of the challenge here is we don’t know the full extent to what Hunter Biden is doing because he had a myriad of accounts offshore, overseas. And what I would say, Sean, is let’s keep in mind, this is being presented as a tax case. One of the reasons prosecutors would want to lead with a tax case is the United States has tax treaties with countries around the world that allows for a lot more broad information sharing when you’re investigating a tax case then if you are investigating something else. So I don’t think there should be any comfort to the Biden family that this is only a tax case. I think this sort of the camel’s nose under the tent. This gives them an opportunity to gain access to foreign bank accounts, foreign transactions, et cetera, and we can start to unravel the full extent of the Biden relationship with the Chinese government.

HANNITY: Between Burisma and China and the first lady of Moscow, and Russian oligarchs, Ukrainian oligarch, Kazakhstan oligarchs, you blew this wide open in 2018. We did the first interview on radio and TV with you. I mean, I’ve got to give you a lot of credit. But now you see people like Senator Johnson and Grassley, they have now also followed up. I mean, it takes a long time to get to the bottom of it. First, imagine if your last name was Trump, and secondly, do you believe this has legal merit that if we follow the law, that there would be severe legal consequences? Because I do believe that.

SCHWEIZER: Yeah, I think there would be and I think, by the way, as this investigation goes forward, you have to turn this into an independent prosecutor. You know, whatever happens in the next six months, this is a highly-politicized issue. You need to have somebody who is truly independent, who is not just a U.S. attorney, who could potentially be fired. And let me say, Sean, I mean, this is one of the most important stories I think politically that we have had in the last decade. You deserve a lot credit. We did the first interview in January 2018. This grand jury was convened months later and I think it was a direct result of the attention you brought to the story.

HANNITY: Well, you did all the hard work. And, by the way, for people that don’t know about the Government Accountability Office, which you run, you go after Republicans and Democrats, you call balls and strikes and I’ve got to give you a lot of credit for that. And you are way ahead of the curve and I think finally everyone is catching up to you. Peter, great work as always. Thank you.

breitbart.com/clips/2020/12/10/schweizer-hunter-biden-tax-case-beginning-of-unravelling-of-full-extent-of-the-biden-china-relationship/

(dailyconservative) – Potential president-elect Joe Biden will leave Delaware next week to campaign for Georgia Democrat Senate candidates Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, who are running in two special runoff elections that will determine which party has the majority in the Senate next year.

Biden plans to travel to Georgia on December 15 to stump for Warnock and Ossoff, making it clear that winning the races are crucial for the Democrat party agenda.

“The Georgia Senate runoffs are crucial — it’s why I’ll be traveling there next Tuesday,” Biden tweeted Thursday, urging supporters to donate to the “Flip Georgia Fund” if they are able.

Trump has already been campaigning in Georgia for the Republican candidates, Sens. David Purdue and Kelly Loeffler, ahead of the runoffs on January 5.

But Biden’s visit comes as early mail-in voting will begin in the state, a critical time for Democrats to get out the vote.

dailyconservative.com/daily-blog/breaking-biden-is-leaving-republicans-in-shock.htm

(breitbart) – Joe Biden admitted he lacks “executive authority” to ban “assault weapons” when the subject was broached during a December 8, 2020, meeting with civil rights leaders.

An audio recording of the meeting was shared by The Intercept’s De-Constructed, and listeners can hear Biden respond to calls for aggressive executive action by assuring the leaders that where possible, he will use executive authority to “undo every damn thing [President Trump] has done by executive authority.”

Biden said, “But I’m not going to exercise executive authority where it’s questioned.” He then referenced doing away with “assault weapons” and said, “There’s no executive authority to do away with that.”

He added, “No one’s fought harder to get rid of ‘assault weapons’ than me, but you can’t do it by executive order. You do that and the next guy comes along and says, ‘Well, guess what, by executive order…everybody can own machine guns again.’”

Biden’s admissions about the limits of executive authority regarding firearms which Democrats label as “assault weapons” points to a scenario where he would have to rely on Senators and U.S. Representatives to pass a ban he could sign.

Breitbart News reported that Associated Press addressed this scenario, noting that Biden’s fight for gun control would be an uphill battle.

The “assault weapons” ban and other gun controls being sought by the left, with the exception of red flag laws, are basically the same controls Democrats have been pursuing since the early 1990s. And the AP reported “it will be a tall order to get a majority of lawmakers on board,” regardless of which party controls Congress.

breitbart.com/politics/2020/12/11/joe-biden-admits-he-lacks-executive-authority-to-ban-assault-weapons/

(breitbart) – Over three-quarters of Republicans view a Trump 2024 presidential run as “likely,” a Politico/Morning Consult survey released Wednesday revealed.

The survey, taken December 4-6 among 1,990 registered voters, found both Republicans and independent voters view a Trump 2024 presidential run as “likely” in the event the current election integrity challenges do not overturn the seeming election results.

Seventy-six percent of Republicans, specifically, said it is likely, as did 60 percent of independents. Forty-seven percent of Democrats agreed.

The survey’s margin of error is +/- 2 percent.

A November Politico/Morning Consult survey found that a majority of Republicans, as well as GOP-leaning independent voters, would support such a bid, giving Trump 53 percent support. No other hypothetical candidate came close, with Vice President Mike Pence garnering 12 percent, followed by Donald Trump Jr. with 8 percent.

While the president and his team have declared that Trump legitimately won the election and has vowed to continue to fight for election integrity, Trump recently hinted that a 2024 run could be forthcoming.

“It’s been an amazing four years. We’re trying to do another four years, otherwise, I’ll see you in four years,” the commander-in-chief said at a White House Christmas party:

This week, Texas filed a lawsuit against Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin over their election procedures, filing the lawsuit directly with the U.S. Supreme Court. President Trump on Wednesday referred to the suit as “the big one.”

breitbart.com/politics/2020/12/09/poll-three-quarters-of-republicans-view-trump-2024-run-as-likely/

(breitbart) – Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer detailed the painful confrontations he had with Sen. Dianne Feinstein about taking away her leadership position on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

“It was like Groundhog Day, but with the pain fresh each time,” Schumer told New Yorker writer Jane Mayer about his conversations with Feinstein, age 87. “Anyone who has tried to take the car keys away from an elderly relative knows how hard it can be.”

Schumer added in Feinstein’s case, “It wasn’t just about a car. It was about the U.S. Senate.”

Feinstein stepped down from her leadership position on the Judiciary Committee in November after the left expressed outrage that she was not tough enough during the Justice Amy Coney Barrett confirmation hearings. Feinstein will remain on the committee, but no longer as the Democrat leader.

Mayer reported that Schumer had “had several serious and painful talks with Feinstein” about her leadership on the committee but she “seemed to forget about the conversations soon after they talked.”

In November, Feinstein asked Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey the same question twice, suggesting she forgot what she said earlier in the hearing.

Several anonymous sources expressed concerns about Feinstein’s mental decline in Mayer’s story, describing her short-term memory as failing, making it difficult to brief her in preparation for hearings.

Feinstein’s term will end in 2024 when she is 91 years old.

breitbart.com/politics/2020/12/10/taking-the-keys-away-chuck-schumer-confronts-dianne-feinsteins-mental-decline/

(breitbart) – The revelation Wednesday that Hunter Biden is under investigation for tax violations relating to his foreign business affairs confirms that the media/Big Tech censorship of stories during the election about his laptop and emails was entirely without merit.

When the New York Post reported on October 14 that Hunter Biden had introduced an official from the corrupt Ukrainian energy company Burisma to then-Vice President Joe Biden — contrary to the latter’s denials that he had ever spoken to his family about their businesses — Facebook announced that it would be suppressing the story, and Twitter prevented people from sharing it. Those who dared were suspended; the Post itself was locked out of its account for more than two weeks.

When the Post followed up with reporting that Hunter Biden had launched a joint venture in 2017 with the CEFC China Energy Co., and that he had reserved 10% for the “big guy,” the media deliberately ignored the story. Never mind that the intended CEO of the new company, Tony Bobulinski, corroborated the story. Never mind that Breitbart News reported independent emails that showed Hunter Biden’s associates bringing Chinese bigwigs to the Obama-Biden White House.

In the final presidential debate, Joe Biden called the story a “Russian plant,” citing a letter by 50 former intelligence officials, including some who spread the “Russia collusion” hoax. Biden lied to to America, as Big Tech and the media applauded.

Now, after the election, we are learning that the laptop is central to the case against Hunter Biden. CNN — which spiked the story in October — reported Wednesday that the tax inquiry included questions about a gift from Ye Jianming, CEFC’s founder. Fox News reported that the laptop, seized by the FBI last year, was central to the investigation against Hunter Biden.

Instead of investigating the story, Silicon Valley and the mainstream media censored it. Here are some major examples:Facebook

Facebook announced that it would be suppressing the story, pending review by its “third-party fact checking partners.” It labeled the story “misinformation.” That move set the tone for the rest of Silicon Valley, and for the mainstream media.Twitter

Twitter shut down all links to the Post story, and locked the Post out of its own account. It also suspended the accounts of people who tried to share the story — even White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany. Twitter’s justification for the censorship kept changing, from claiming that the story was dangerous, to claiming that it involved hacked materials. CEO Jack Dorsey eventually admitted the company had been wrong, but kept the Post account locked for more than two weeks.

The Biden campaign would cite Twitter and Facebook’s censorship as reason enough to treat the story as misinformation.Washington Post

The Post suggested that the story was Russian disinformation, since Rudy Giuliani was one of the sources. It reported that “President Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani was the target of an influence operation by Russian intelligence.” One article in the Post advised readers to treat the Hunter Biden emails as foreign intelligence “even if they probably aren’t.”Wikipedia

The Internet’s go-to source for common knowledge decided to censor the story. As Breitbart News reported: “Editors recently deemed the [New York] Post an ‘unreliable source’ on Wikipedia and cited this as a reason to exclude mention of the story.” Later, Wikipedia continued to suppress the story, calling it “Russian interference” and claiming that it had been “debunked.”CBS News

CBS said the story was about “a laptop allegedly full of [Hunter Biden’s] old e-mails. It’s a story raising concerns about whether it’s real or just designed to sow confusion in the final weeks of the election.” It compared the story to Wikileaks. Leslie Stahl, interviewing President Donald Trump, said the laptop could not be verified — because “it can’t be verified.”Fox News

While Fox did some reporting on the story, Chris Wallace — who had moderated the first presidential debate — poured scorn on the story, calling it “completely unverified” and adding that “Rudy Giuliani is not the most reliable source anymore.”MSNBC

MSNBC treated the Hunter Biden laptop story as if it were disinformation — to the extent the network covered it at all. Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough called it “false,” saying it was “one of the stupidest October surprises I’ve ever seen.”New York Times

The Times tried to discredit the story by reporting that staff at the New York Post doubted the authenticity of the story. As Breitbart News’ John Nolte pointed out, the Times never bothered to dispute the facts that the Post had actually reported.Politico

Politico reported the letter from intelligence officials who called the Post story Russian “disinformation.” It also reported that the Biden campaign could not deny that a meeting with the Burisma executive may have happened, but it buried the lede. Later, after the election, Politico gloated that the Hunter Biden laptop story had “fizzled,” calling it a distraction.Axios

Axios media reporter Sara Fischer praised the censorship of the Post story, saying that the “defense systems” had worked. She credited intelligence agencies who had worked with Big Tech to identify materials that had possibly been hacked.CNN

CNN deliberately spiked the story, and media reporter Brian Stelter demanded more censorship from Silicon Valley. He defended the media’s “ethics” on the story and dismissed it as “a classic example of the right-wing media machine.”National Public Radio

Taxpayer-funded NPR ignored the story, explaining to the public: “We don’t want to waste our time on stories that are not really stories, and we don’t want to waste listeners’ and readers’ time on that stories that are just pure distractions.”ABC New

During a 90-minute town hall meeting with Joe Biden, ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos failed to ask the candidate a single question about Hunter Biden, or about the Post story on the laptop, which had come out just the day before.NBC News

NBC tried to debunk the Hunter Biden laptop story with a story titled “How a fake persona laid the groundwork for a Hunter Biden conspiracy deluge.” It claimed Trump associates were sharing a 64-page document full of falsehoods about Biden.

breitbart.com/the-media/2020/12/09/pollak-mainstream-media-big-tech-coverup-collapses-with-hunter-biden-investigation-laptop/

(breitbart) – On Wednesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “The Story,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) stated that the revelation that Hunter Biden’s taxes are under investigation will bring back the issue “of how and why many major news organizations and social media platforms tried to tap down the New York Post story about the laptop and the things on it.”

Kennedy said, [relevant remarks begin around 2:20] “I think this issue — or this new disclosure rather, is also going to raise the issue again of how and why many major news organizations and social media platforms tried to tap down the New York Post story about the laptop and the things on it.”

breitbart.com/clips/2020/12/09/gop-sen-kennedy-hunter-biden-revelations-raise-issue-of-why-media-and-tech-clamped-down-on-n-y-post-reporting/

(breitbart) – Vice Admiral Sam Paparo, who commands the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet, said Sunday the U.S. has achieved “uneasy deterrence” with Iran, a sign that if President Donald Trump leaves office, he will hand a vastly improved situation to his successor.

In January 2016, the last year that President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden were in office, Iran seized two U.S. Navy boats and took the sailors aboard prisoner, forcing them to kneel and releasing humiliating photographs to the world.

The incident happened just months after the United Nations Security Council approved the Iran nuclear deal. (The Obama administration took the Iran deal to the UN and never submitted it to the Senate for approval, as the Constitution requires.)

In May 2018, President Trump withdrew from the Iran deal. In June 2019, he called off an airstrike against Iran that would have retaliated for the downing of a U.S. Navy drone. But in January 2020, Trump ordered a strike in Iraq on General Qasem Soulemani, the leader of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, classified as a terror group by the Trump administration. Iran’s largely ineffective response — missiles fired at U.S. troops in Iraq — confirmed America’s new regional deterrence.

“We have achieved an uneasy deterrence. That uneasy deterrence is exacerbated by world events and by events along the way,” Vice Admiral Paparo said, according to a report by the Times of Israel. “But I have found Iranian activity at sea to be cautious and circumspect and respectful, to not risk unnecessary miscalculation or escalation at sea.”

In plans for his incoming administration, Biden has said he intends to return to the Iran deal. He has said he would drop existing U.S. sanctions to entice Iran to negotiate, as the Obama administration did, without broader agreement on Iran’s destructive regional policies.

breitbart.com/middle-east/2020/12/06/u-s-navy-official-we-have-achieved-uneasy-deterrence-with-iran/