Salem News Channel

Last-minute ceasefire talks between the United States and Iran look uncertain as a two-week truce is set to expire and both sides say they’re prepared to resume fighting. A White House official says Vice President JD Vance, who is expected to lead the U.S. delegation if talks resume in Pakistan, remained in Washington on Tuesday and had meetings scheduled Wednesday morning. Pakistan’s information minister says Iran has not formally confirmed whether it will participate. The ceasefire is set to expire on Wednesday. Both sides remain firm, with President Donald Trump warning of potential conflict and Iran hinting at new strategies. An Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman says there has been “no final decision” on whether to attend ceasefire talks.

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Two Americans killed in a vehicle crash as they returned from destroying a clandestine drug lab in a rugged region of Mexico over the weekend were working for the CIA, according to a U.S. official and two other people familiar with matter. Two Mexican investigators also were killed in the crash, which Mexican authorities said occurred while the officials were returning from an operation to destroy drug labs of criminal groups. The CIA's involvement was confirmed Tuesday by a U.S. official and two people with knowledge of the crash who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive intelligence matters. The identity of the two Americans as CIA officers was earlier reported by The Washington Post. Confirmation of the CIA’s involvement comes after days of contradictions from Mexican and U.S. authorities about the role U.S. officials played in an operation to bust a narco-laboratory in northern Chihuahua. The lack of clarity by authorities reignited a debate over the extent of U.S. involvement in Mexican security operations at a moment when Mexican President Sheinbaum has come under extreme pressure by the Trump administration to crack down on cartels.

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A college student from China has been charged with illegally taking photos of U.S. military planes in Nebraska during a multistate road trip that included a stop at an Air Force base in South Dakota. Tianrui Liang, 21, was arrested April 7 at a New York airport while trying to leave the U.S. for Glasgow, Scotland, where he attends school, the FBI said in a court filing. Liang admitted that he got out of a car on a public road in late March and took photos of an RC-135, a reconnaissance aircraft, and an E-4B at Offutt Air Force Base near Omaha, the FBI said. The E-4B, known as the “Nightwatch”, can serve as an airborne command center for a president and military officials in times of emergency, according to the Air Force. The FBI said it's illegal to photograph or sketch defense installations without approval. Images of both planes are available online. Liang told investigators that it was ”legal to take pictures of the sky, but he knew it was illegal to take pictures of the planes on the ground," the FBI said. He said they were for his personal collection, the FBI said. Liang's attorney, Jeff Thomas, declined to comment Tuesday. Liang has not appeared yet in federal court in Omaha. Liang flew to Vancouver, British Columbia, in Canada on March 26 and met a friend who is a college student in New York, the FBI said. They drove across the U.S. border in Washington state before Liang drove alone to see Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota, according to the affidavit. The FBI said he was also interested in going to Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma. Other cases involving military sites have been filed against college students from China. Five men were charged with lying and trying to cover their tracks after they were confronted in the dark in 2023 near a Michigan military site where thousands of people had gathered for drills. They graduated from the University of Michigan and apparently returned to China months before they were charged and have never appeared in court. In 2020, two Chinese nationals who were pursuing master’s degrees at the University of Michigan were sentenced to prison for illegally taking photographs at a naval air station in Key West, Florida.

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Ahead of more peace talks with Iran, President Trump is predicting a “great deal” to end the war. The president believes Iran “has no choice” but to reach an agreement with the United States. He tells CNBC that he doesn’t want to extend the ceasefire which expires Wednesday and he expects a “great deal.” At the same time, the president continues to threaten more fighting and more bombs if negotiators fail to end the war, saying the military is “ready to go.”

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Authorities say an explosion at a Texas natural gas or oil well site has set off a large fire, leading to some evacuations, but no injuries. The Nacogdoches County Sheriff's Office received calls late Monday about a loud explosion in Etoile, a small rural community in eastern Texas. The sheriff's office said it happened at an oil well site. The city of Nacogdoches described it as a natural gas well. Several residents evacuated as a precaution and others were asked to shelter in place. The fire was still burning early Tuesday, but was not spreading. Drilling company H&P says the cause of the well blowout is not yet known.

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U.S. forces have boarded an oil tanker previously sanctioned for smuggling Iranian crude oil in Asia. The Pentagon said Tuesday on social media that U.S. forces “conducted a right-of-visit maritime interdiction” and boarded the M/T Tifani “without incident.” A U.S. defense official says the tanker was captured in the Bay of Bengal and carrying Iranian oil. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing military operation, says the U.S. military will decide in the next four days what to do with the vessel. It’s the latest move in the U.S. war on Iran to stop any ship tied to Tehran or those suspected of carrying supplies that could help its government.

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The Pentagon wants to triple its spending on drone technology. In a clear indication that drones and other unmanned vehicles have emerged as key weapons of war, the Pentagon’s new budget proposal would allocate nearly $54 billion for military drones and related technology. The Defense Department request also includes $21 billion for weapons systems designed to take down enemy drones. A Pentagon official said “drone warfare is rapidly reshaping the modern battlefield.”

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Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Tuesday that the U.S. military will no longer require all American troops to get the flu vaccine, citing “medical autonomy” and religious freedom. “The notion that a flu vaccine must be mandatory for every service member, everywhere, in every circumstance at all times is just overly broad and not rational,” Hegseth said in a video posted on social media. He said American service members are free to get the flu vaccine but will not be forced to “because your body, your faith and your convictions are not negotiable.” Hegseth’s directive does allow for the military services to request to keep the vaccine requirement in place, according to a memo enacting the policy posted online. It says the services have 15 days to make those requests. Vaccination programs in the U.S. military date back to the American Revolution. But they became a contentious political issue during the coronavirus pandemic, when more than 8,400 troops were forced out of the military for refusing to obey the 2021 mandate for the COVID-19 vaccine. Thousands of others sought religious and medical exemptions. Congress agreed to rescind the mandate, which the Pentagon dropped in January 2023, after roughly 99% of active duty troops in the Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps had gotten the vaccine, and 98% of those in the Army. The Guard and Reserve rates are lower but generally are more than 90%. The Trump administration then spent months crafting a policy to allow service members who refused to take the mandatory COVID-19 vaccine to reenter service with back pay. While only a tiny fraction have taken the Pentagon up on the new policy, Hegseth’s team has spent the past several months personally highlighting them. The Pentagon stated in March that 153 service members who were separated under the COVID-19 mandate had been reinstated or "re-accessed." The dropping of the flu vaccine mandate follows what health officials said was a particularly severe flu season when U.S. infections surged. Public health experts recommend that everyone 6 months and older get an annual influenza vaccine. The Trump administration has been working to dial back vaccine recommendations. It stated earlier this year that it will no longer recommend flu shots and some other types of vaccines for all children, saying it’s a decision parents and patients should make in consultation with their doctors. A federal judge has temporarily blocked that effort as a lawsuit plays out. The Congressional Research Service listed eight mandatory vaccines for service members in a 2021 report. They included vaccines for the flu, polio and tetanus as well as the measles and hepatitis A and B. Service members could request to opt out of a vaccine requirement for religious reasons, the report stated. But the unit commander was required to seek input from medical and religious representatives, while also counseling the service member on the potential impact on their ability to deploy. A military physician also had to counsel the service member on the benefits and risks of forgoing a required vaccination. The Congressional Research Service noted that the military instituted its first vaccination program in 1777 when Gen. George Washington directed the inoculation of the Continental Army to protect personnel from smallpox.

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NATO intercepted Russian strategic bombers and fighter jets that flew over the Baltic Sea on Monday, a muscular display of air power on the alliance’s eastern flank away from the spotlight on the Middle East. French Rafale fighters were deployed from a Lithuanian air base where they are stationed as part of a decades-long NATO air-policing effort. The fighters armed with air-to-air missiles joined jets from Sweden, Finland, Poland, Denmark and Romania. They all took to the skies to inspect and keep watch on the Russian flight, the French detachment said. The Russian mission included two supersonic Tu-22M3s, as well as about 10 fighters — both SU-30s and SU-35s — that took turns escorting the larger strategic bombers, according to the statement. The Russian Defense Ministry said the long-range bombers' flight was scheduled and occurred in airspace over the neutral waters of the Baltic Sea. The flight took more than four hours, the ministry said Monday on Telegram. “At certain stages of the route, the long-range bombers were accompanied by fighters of foreign states,” the ministry said. “Crews of long-range aviation regularly conduct flights over the neutral waters of the Arctic, the North Atlantic, the Pacific Ocean, as well as the Baltic and Black Seas. All flights of Russian Aerospace Forces aircraft are carried out in strict compliance with international rules for the use of airspace.” The ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday. It often reports flights by its strategic bombers over the Baltic Sea, including in January — when NATO jets also flew up to meet them — and at least four times last year. NATO’s Allied Air Command also did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Tuesday. The military alliance routinely scrambles fighter aircraft to intercept Russian warplanes that approach or fly near NATO airspace. NATO says the Russian planes it intercepts often fail to use their transponders and don't communicate with air traffic controllers or file a flight plan. NATO jets are sent up to identify them. Many of the Russian flights that NATO monitors with its Baltic air policing mission, in place since Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia joined the alliance in 2004, are to and from the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. Even before the war in Ukraine, NATO was intercepting Russian planes around 300 times each year, mostly over waters around northern Europe. A journalist from The Associated Press witnessed the French detachment's response on Monday from the sprawling Šiauliai Air Base in Lithuania. NATO uses the base for fighter patrols that police the skies on the alliance’s eastern flank. Two French Rafale fighter jets’ two-man crews — a pilot and a navigator — were seen racing in two vans to the planes’ hangars from the headquarters building the French detachment uses during its four-month deployment on the air base. The crews were already suited up because they’d been on standby, so they would be ready to take to the air within minutes if scrambled. The two crews quickly took their places in their planes’ cockpits. They were then put on hold, with the planes’ jet engines ignited, until they got the order to take off. Then they taxied out of their hangars and roared off into the clear skies. Monday's flight was the latest in Russia's maneuvers over the Baltic Sea. Lithuania's defense ministry said NATO jets were scrambled four times from April 13-19 to intercept Russian aircraft that violated flight rules that included turning off flight transponders and flying without a flight plan.

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Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick is resigning rather than be formally disciplined by the House as part of an ethics investigation into her use of campaign funds. The Florida Democrat on Tuesday said a House committee denied her adequate time to prepare a defense. Cherfilus-McCormick says rather than play political games, she's stepping away. Members of the House Ethics Committee had been set to weigh what punishment to recommend after they found Cherfilus-McCormick committed 25 violations of House rules and ethical standards. Republicans had already called for her expulsion. Cherfilus-McCormick also faces federal criminal charges accusing her of stealing $5 million in coronavirus disaster relief funds. Cherfilus-McCormick denies any wrongdoing.

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Representative Anna Paulina Luna Joins The Scott Jennings Show!

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Despite mountains of evidence proving the opposite, Democrats and their media allies continue to cheer for America’s setbacks on the world stage.

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Democrats campaign as moderates to win, then pivot to more aggressive policies and power plays—like gerrymandering and institutional changes—to lock in long-term control.

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How to Judge the Success of Islamabad 2.0?

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THE M & M EXPERIENCE: Tucker Carlson The Grifter

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Faith & Freedom 250 - Episode 28: Classical Christian Education: Returning To A Proven Model Courtesy of The Herzog Foundation.

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With Steve Moore, Committee to Unleash Prosperity, former economist at the Trump White House, author of the daily “Hotline” newsletter from the Committee to Unleash Prosperity | Co-author of The Trump Economic Miracle: And the Plan to Unleash Prosperity Again.

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Liberals Love Making Fake Narratives about Trump

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Iran "Got Cute"

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What Is A Real “Win” In Iran Talks?

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