Leland Vittert’s War Notes: “At War with the Federal Government” 🚨

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NewsNation Chief Washington Anchor and On Balance host Leland Vittert was a foreign correspondent for four years in Jerusalem. He gives you an early look at tonight's 9 p.m. ET show, delivered straight to your inbox.

Hello Chicago👋: I want to see you on Saturday, January 17 at Kenilworth Union Church.

✏️The GREAT Ben Bradley of WGN-TV will interview me and then I'll be signing copies of "Born Lucky" from 2 to 3 p.m.
📚Click HERE to RSVP.

Bipartisan Buffoonery 🤪

🤪Tonight's buffoonery from the Left and the Right

🐘Vice President JD Vance when asked about whether the conservative movement should tolerate anti-semitism: "Does the conservative movement need to warehouse anybody out there espousing anti-Semitism in anyway?"
- 🎤Vance: "No, it doesn't, Scott. I think that we need to reject all forms of ethnic hatred, whether it's anti-Semitism, anti-Black hatred, anti-white hatred. And I think it's one of the great things about the conservative coalition is that we are, I think, fundamentally rooted in the Christian principles that founded the United States of America. And one of those very important principles is that we judge people as individuals. Every person is made in the image of God. You judge them by what they do, not by what ethnic group they belong to."
  - 🤣I never thought I would see a Republican have to dodge a question from Scott Jennings.
🫏Tonight's winner on the Left: Jennifer Welch
- 🎤Welch: "They're a crime party! They are okay with crime… That is something the Democrats need to start messaging and really really beating the drum on that about how pro crime the Republican party is, it is a mafia style syndicate… ... The whole movement is a whole criminal enterprise… Anybody that's a Republican that says I'm for law and order, tell them to go f*ck themselves!"
  - 🤦Democrats have many problems –
    - 🗣️Thinking angry old rich progressive white women lecturing everybody is a winning strategy is one of them.

Show me the Beef 🥩: Now parents struggling to buy groceries face a new headache — an "inverted' food pyramid unveiled today by Robert F. Kennedy Jr and the Make America Healthy Again crowd.

In short 🥗: Stop eating carbs and ultra processed foods — time for more meats, fruits and veggies.
- 💰DUH! If you can afford it.
- 🏪Good luck finding that at the Boomer West Virginia Dollar Tree
- 🤷If we are going to be serious about this, we have to be serious about how to get this healthy food affordable.
- Watch tonight 📺: NewsNation Batya Ungar-Sargon on the hypocrisy.

People are Going to *Keep* Getting Killed🚨

‼️The deadly ICE shooting in Minneapolis today was and is predictable and preventable

🤷In fact, we predicted if blue mayors, governors and lawmakers kept demonizing ICE and calling for violent confrontations — it would happen.
- 😮Woah! Ever the man with words, Governor Tim Walz suggests Minnesota is at war with the federal government
  - 🎤"I said this yesterday, we've never been at war with our federal government," said Walz
    - 🤷I don't know about you but that sounds like an insurrection.
  - 🤦Walz suggests the agent could have been "rogue." Would anybody be surprised by George Floyd-like riots in Minneapolis tonight?
Look back 🔙: Just a few days ago the Minneapolis mayor said sending ICE is about "sowing chaos on the streets of Minneapolis."
Yikes 😮: And today after the shooting he said ICE needed to "get the f**k out". Yes, the mayor said that.
- Irony 🤦: He is far angrier at ICE for a "justified and legal shooting" than the multi-billion dollar Somali fraud in his city, but I digress.
- Back to the news 📰: When you say stuff like that, even when followed up by calls for peaceful protests — sooner or later people take you up on it.
  - 📷Democrats want the images of confrontations with ICE.
    - ❄️ MS NOW was wall to wall with people throwing snowballs and "confronting" ICE before the shooting.
- Facts ✅: These are NOT protests — I have covered many protests. They are people marching and chanting.
  - ‼️Violent confrontations are groups of activists seeking out ICE agents and harassing them.
Facts✅: Anybody getting shot by law enforcement is awful — for them, the officer or the agent.
- 📹A slow-motion of the video and a bullet hole thru the windshield appears to confirm the shooting was "justified" legally — that doesn't make it good.
- 🎤As Trump said "it's a horrible thing to watch."
- 📺As of now we don't know anything about the woman killed except she is 37-years-old and a U.S. citizen — watch tonight for updated information.
Zoom out 🌎: The shooting exposes the biggest vulnerability for both Republicans and Democrats.
- ‼️It's the vulnerability for Republicans who took a moment in the House today destroying everyone over the Somali fraud and it got completely overshadowed by the ICE confrontation and then shooting.
- 📹On the flip side, it's the footage of someone getting shot.
  - 🗣️And Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey is already threatening violence —
    - 🎤"To ICE, get the f**k out of Minneapolis," said Frey at today's press conference
  - 🔥Then the crowd burned American flags and marched with Mexicans.

Jump ball ⚽: Draws usually go to the home team and when it comes to immigration the home team is the Republicans.

➕Plus the continued messaging by Democrats demonizing ICE doesn't work.

Watch tonight📺: NewsNation Chris Cillizza and Senator Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., join us.

Trump Confronts Putin‼️

🤷For those of you who think President Trump is soft on President Putin — Trump now has an oil tanker to sell you.

🚢The U.S. military captured a sanctioned Russian flagged oil tanker this morning in the North Atlantic off Iceland
- The empty tanker made a U-turn and escaped a boarding attempt by U.S. forces last week in the Caribbean near Venezuela.
🤷He's doing something President Biden never did — calling Putin's bluff.
- 🎤"The world's criminals are on notice. You can run, but you can't hide. We will never relent in our mission to protect the American people and disrupt the funding of narco terrorism wherever we find it, period," says Secretary Kristi Noem.
🤣Trump spit in Putin's face by ordering the ships take over despite flying a Russian flag and surrounded by Russian navy vessels.
🚨These are dangerous times — but Putin respects strength.
- 💪The world is a safer place when America is strong.

Watch tonight📺: Mary Kissel, Michael O'Hanlon and Elliot Ackerman on how Putin responds.

WATCH ON BALANCE WEEKNIGHTS AT 9P/8C

Every night during On Balance, Leland Vittert asks "why?" about the most pressing matters of the day, with an intellectual, balanced and sometimes irreverent take on the news.

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