Kyle Rittenhouse told Louder With Crowder (LWC) on Wednesday that Arizona State University (ASU) wasn’t honest in their characterization of his enrollment status, and declared he will attend ASU in the spring despite student activists’ pushback late last month.
Rittenhouse was vindicated by a jury of all charges last month, proving he’d lawfully exercised self defense during the Kenosha riots. During Wednesday’s episode of political news and comedy show Louder with Crowder, Rittenhouse explained that he’s a student at ASU currently.
“Yeah, it’s online. I took a compassionate withdrawal from my classes. My professors offered it and then a week later they gave me a compassionate withdrawal which – thank you for that. But then they came out with a statement saying, ‘Oh no no, he’s not enrolled at ASU anymore.’ I’m enrolled, I’m just not in any classes, but I have a student portfolio,” said Rittenhouse.
AZ Free News inquired with ASU about the technicality of student portfolios and enrollment. ASU spokesman Jay Thorne told AZ Free News it couldn’t go into detail about Rittenhouse’s enrollment status due to FERPA law. Their official statement contradicted Rittenhouse’s claim, saying he wasn’t enrolled currently.
“Kyle Rittenhouse did not go through the ASU admissions process but was enrolled in two publicly available online courses for this semester. University records show that he is now no longer enrolled, a status precipitated by his own actions,” stated Thorne.
That wasn’t all that Rittenhouse had to say about his future education. Rittenhouse also told LWC that he wasn’t deterred by the socialist and social justice student protestors at ASU.
“There weren’t even a lot of protestors there. It was a very, very small amount. And then people are just like, ‘I thought you were getting an education?’ and I’m like, yes, that’s what I want to do,” explained Rittenhouse. “I want to go to law school. I’m going to ASU in the spring in person. I want to do my four year undergrad there before I take the LSAT and go do my three years of law.”
Some recognizable faces were among the protestors’ number. One of the featured speakers there was Mastaani Qureshi – one of the three women found guilty of ASU’s Code of Conduct for harassing two white male peers with apparently rival political beliefs out of a common space on campus. Mastaani apparently took issue with another white male that represented apparently rival political beliefs, Rittenhouse, for his potential attendance at ASU. She claimed he was a white supremacist, vigilante, and killer.
“We want to say that Kyle Rittenhouse is not just any random killer, he’s a white supremacist killer. He is a vigilante. He is the descendant of white Americans who killed black and brown people. White supremacists back in the day were also acquitted of all charges if we have read history,” asserted Mastaani. “Kyle Rittenhouse didn’t get a guilty verdict because he was f*****g white!”
The entire Kenosha ordeal has shaped Rittenhouse’s career goals. Rittenhouse originally expressed an intent to study nursing, a desire reflected by his reason for being in Kenosha that fateful night last August: to put out fires and administer first aid to anyone present. Then on Wednesday, Rittenhouse confirmed with Crowder that he intends to study law instead of nursing because of the prosecutorial misconduct he witnessed and experienced during his trial.
“I want to be a criminal defense attorney,” said Rittenhouse. “I’m big on, no matter who the person is, I believe everybody deserves fair and good legal representation.”
OJ Simpson jury consultant Jo-Ellan Dimitrius helped select the jury for Rittenhouse’s trial. Rittenhouse said that she was an amazing support for them.
“She’s a phenomenal jury consultant. She’s more than that for us, though. She was a rock for my mom – someone my mom could lean on and hold during this entire ordeal,” said Rittenhouse.
Teachers’ unions appear to have run into a buzz saw. On October 25, American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten tweeted enthusiastic support for a Washington Post article titled “Parents claim they have the right to shape their kids’ school curriculum. They don’t.”
By November 6, her message had drastically changed. “Parents have to be involved in their kids’ education. They must have a voice. At the same time, we have to teach kids how to—not what to—think.” Sure, Randi.
In the interval, there had been a reality shock: the Virginia governor’s election, this time with an electorate that had wised up. Parents had been appalled when they remotely observed the overtly racist curriculum their children were being taught and then shocked at the blowback, including being charged with “white supremacy,” when they protested.
Moreover, they now realized the unions were responsible for the damaging school COVID shutdowns. Weingarten herself pressured legislatures and school districts into closures. Unions influenced the Biden CDC into adding new and impossible conditions for reopening. They threatened outright strikes if school districts tried to reopen for the 2020-2021 school year.
Voters were not amused. When Terry McAuliffe vowed, “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach,” the damage was done. Polls showed challenger Glenn Youngkin gaining 15-17 points among parents in the last weeks of the campaign. Education-oriented voters swung from favoring McAuliffe by 33 points to a nine-point Youngkin advantage.
Weingarten’s response was that the reports had all been a massive misunderstanding, that it was actually the teachers’ unions that had tried to reopen the schools. Her pathetic gaslighting attempts were ignored.
The longtime symbiotic relationship between the teachers’ unions and the Democrats may be fraying. They both earn the other’s loyalty. According to OpenSecrets, 99.72% of the AFT contributions in 2020 went to Democrats. Fully 97% of AFT donations have gone to Democrats since 1990.
In Virginia, McAuliffe bagged $1 million from the unions. AFT ran ads for McAuliffe, and Weingarten personally stumped for him.
Their money isn’t wasted. As governor, McAuliffe had vetoed nine school choice bills. This year, he affirmed on CNN, “I will never allow [school choice] as governor.” Nationwide, Democrats have been able to stymie the movement for universal school choice in spite of growing majorities in favor.
The Democrats are in a sticky situation now. According to RealClearOpinion research, voters’ support for school choice surged from 64% to 74% in just the last year. Another poll showed 78% approve of Education Savings Accounts, the most comprehensive method for funding parental choice directly.
Voters have expressed particular contempt for politicians (and educators) who send their own children to private schools but deny the same privilege to less fortunate children. 62% of voters said they would be less likely to vote for such a hypocrite.
Terry McAuliffe, for one, got the message. The veto king sent his five children to private schools. When asked about it on NBC this year, his verbatim quote was “Chuck, we have a great school system in Virginia. Dorothy and I have raised our five children.” You’ve gotta love it.
Democrats are stuck with a policy that is not only morally and educationally wrong but is a political loser. Advocates for children and parents should seize the opportunity to not only win some elections but to fundamentally reform the structure of education in America into a system that serves students and parents, not bureaucracies.
Teachers’ unions must be publicly held accountable. These organizations which relentlessly pound a “for the children” theme have a wretched record of not promoting their educational interests.
In the 1960s, when the unions first rose to influence, about $3,000 (inflation-adjusted) dollars were spent per student. Today, that number is over $13,000. Yet academic achievement and the ethnic gap have stubbornly failed to improve.
Not all of the spending increase has gone to teacher salaries, and not all of the fault for academic failure is theirs. But as the dominant influence in education policy for the last half-century, unions must bear major responsibility for the dismal outcomes.
Parents’ rights advocates: take heart. This is our time.
The No Surprises Act passed by Congress in the waning days of Donald Trump’s presidency to better inform patients of the costs of medical procedures and other services doesn’t take effect until Jan. 1, but the Biden Administration is already getting pushback on how it intends to implement one provision of the new law.
That pushback is coming from health care providers who recently blanketed federal officials with negative comments about a regulatory rule issued by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) the providers claim goes against the language of the Act, which was passed to formulate a nationwide process for resolving “surprise” or unexpected medical bills.
The two most common expected billing problems patients face in Arizona result from being treated by an out-of-network doctor at a medical facility within their network, or when a patient requires emergency or urgent care at an out-of-network facility.
For those in rural areas, a third common surprise billing issue involves charges for out-of-network air ambulance, or medical evacuation, services.
Under the new law, a patient’s copayment for an out-of-network bill will be limited to roughly what the patient’s copayment would be had the service or procedure been fully conducted in-network. Any unpaid balance can be challenged by the out-of-network provider, who must first attempt to negotiate the matter with the patient’s insurer or commercial health plan.
The rule also establishes an arbitration process the provider must follow if an agreement cannot be reached with the insurer / health plan. And after that, according to the American Hospital Association and other provider groups, is where the rule as currently written verves away from the intention of the new law
As put forth by HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra, the rule requires an arbitrator to consider an insurer or health plan’s in-network median payment rate for the service or procedure in question as the “presumptively correct” rate. Priority is given to that rate over other factors mentioned in the Act, such as complexity of the billed procedure or service, whether a party engaged in good faith during negotiations, and the health care provider’s training and expertise.
“By directing arbiters to presume that the plan’s or issuer’s median contracted rate is the appropriate out-of-network reimbursement rate and creating a significantly higher bar for consideration of other factors means that the [independent dispute resolution] process effectively will be unavailing for providers,” according to Stacey Hughes, AHA executive vice president.
But not everyone in the health care industry is opposed to the rule’s presumption of the reimbursable rate during arbitration. Insurance companies and commercial health plan support the arbitration rules which make it harder for out-of-network providers to receive payment.
It is also seen as a way to force providers to sign on to more networks to reduce the cost of getting paid.
“The approach taken in the interim final rules is a clear win for hardworking people,” said Matthew Eyles of America’s Health Insurance Plans, a national association whose members provide health care coverage. “This is the right approach to encourage hospitals, health care providers, and health insurance providers to work together and negotiate in good faith. It will also ensure that arbitration does not result in unnecessary premium increases for businesses and hardworking American families.
For now, the Biden Administration appears to be standing behind the rule even though 35 percent of the U.S. House of Representatives signed off on a letter in November urging the presumptive rate rule be reconsidered.
The Biden-Harris Administration will continue implementing federal regulations from the No Surprises Act to not only protect the patients but also curb rising costs in health care,” Becerra said in response to the pushback. “We want costs to go down. When the arbitration process is wide open, no boundaries, at the end of the day health care costs go up, not down.”
The No Surprises Act was passed as part of the Consolidated Appropriations Act.
The decision by President Joe Biden to sharply increase the tariff on Canadian softwood lumber to 17.99 percent is threatening housing affordability and has prompted calls from The Wall Street Journal and homebuilders for the White House to take quick action to reverse course.
More than one-quarter of softwood lumber—such as pine, cedar, fir, and spruce—used in America comes from Canada. The new tariff is twice the 8.99 percent rate in effect when Biden took office in January. It comes on the heels of wholesale lumber prices which tripled from July 2020 to July 2021, adding nearly $30,000 to the average cost of a new home, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB).
The NAHB says the increased tariff is adding on average another $9,000 to the price of a new home compared to July. It is also pushing up prices of renovation and remodeling projects that are critical for ensuring affordable housing options in many communities.
“The doubling of duties on Canadian softwood lumber is ill-timed and ill-advised,” NAHB Chairman John C. Fowke wrote to Biden on Dec. 3. “As has been the case for decades, the domestic lumber industry cannot, nor will not, produce enough lumber to meet U.S. consumer demand. We rely on lumber from Canada to fill the production gap, so punitive tariffs on our closest and best trading partner on a product that American consumers desperately need defies logic.”
Top NAHB officials met at the Canadian Embassy in Washington DC last week to discuss the tariffs. After the meeting, Fowke send his letter to Biden, calling on U.S. trade officials to negotiate with the Canadian government for a lumber trade agreement that eliminates tariffs and ensures a fairly priced supply of lumber.
“The tariffs harm housing affordability by acting as a tax on American home builders and home buyers, and contribute to huge price volatility in the lumber market by putting upward pressure on lumber prices,” Fowke wrote.
The association, which has 140,000 members across the country, also called on Biden to support efforts to increase domestic lumber production. “Improving the health of our nation’s forests and increasing the supply of domestic timber are not mutually exclusive goals,” Fowke wrote.
Last month the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board noted that prices for U.S.-produced lumber is at more than 75 percent above pre-pandemic levels.
“For decades U.S. sawmills haven’t been able to meet domestic demand, but they’ve leaned on government to protect their market share,” the WSJ’s opinion stated. “The shortage would be much worse if not for Canadian lumber, which backs up U.S. output.”
The tariffs, the WSJ wrote, “will raise building costs in an already strained housing market.”
Then last week, The Washington Post’s editorial board published an opinion succinctly titled “Biden is hiking lumber tariffs at the wrong time.”
And the editorial board for the Las Vegas Review-Journal wrote that driving up the cost of lumber via tariffs will discourage construction and worsen inventory shortages for southern Nevada. “Much like the weather, politicians love to talk about affordable housing but none of them want to do anything about it. Put the Biden administration firmly in that camp,” the Review-Journal noted.
The city of Phoenix decided to suspend the city’s vaccine mandate after a federal judge halted President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate for federal contractors. The city based its mandate for its employees under an interpretation of its workforce as federal contractors based on the amount of federal dollars and contractors it had.
The Phoenix City Council was scheduled to discuss their vaccine mandate during a policy session on Tuesday. Since the city announced the mandate’s suspension shortly before the meeting took place, officials instead modified the agenda item to showcase how well the city had handled the pandemic, the timeline of events preceding the mandate, and an explanation why the city classified itself as a federal contractor.
In light of today’s federal court ruling, temporarily blocking a requirement for all federal contract workers getting the #COVID19 vaccine, the city of #PHX will pause implementation of the federal mandate requiring city workers be vaccinated by Jan. 18. pic.twitter.com/0XRW1VtJBt
City Manager Jeff Barton offered a prelude to the presentation by insisting that the mandate was decided upon for the greater good.
“The January 18 vaccine mandate was not a city of Phoenix mandate. It was a federal mandate passed onto the city via executive order and with today’s ruling our city has halted implementation,” emphasized Barton. “Our fight against COVID-19 has forced us to be creative and innovative with our service delivery, and at times has forced us to make extremely difficult decisions as public servants for the greater good.”
Barton added that city administrators were “extremely flexible” with their COVID-19 policies for employees throughout the pandemic.
“I value their right to personal choice, religious freedom, and other convictions. But I also have an obligation to ensure the city operates within state and federal laws,” said Barton.
A week after the city announced their mandate, Councilman Sal DiCiccio called for a public vote on the mandate. DiCiccio said that the mandate would only strain further an already critically manned first responder force.
The response of first responders to the mandate was consistent with DiCiccio’s assessment. The Phoenix Law Enforcement Association (PLEA) and The United Phoenix Firefighters Association (UPFA) joined Attorney General Mark Brnovich’s lawsuit against President Joe Biden’s vaccine mandate for federal contractors and employees.
Another big win to stop Biden's unconstitutional COVID-19 vaccine mandates for federal contractors.
