February 20, 2026 Insider Report

Building Our Enemy: China Still Gobbling Up High-end Chips and Chip Forges

News Flash to politicians and media: China is preparing for war. All-out kinetic, military war. The communist regime has already been engaged in what it calls “Unrestricted Warfare” — economic, social, and political offensives, espionage, propaganda, technological theft, cyberattacks, disinformation, critical infrastructure attacks, and more — in other words, all-out asymmetric warfare against the United States and the West. A bipartisan group of congressmen have sent Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick a letter (see below) urging the Trump administration to close critical gaps in U.S. export controls over semiconductor manufacturing equipment (SME) and to more vigorously engage our allies to adopt similar restrictions on those technologies that threaten their and our security. That would seem to be a no-brainer since China’s phenomenal military expansion has been (and continues to be) built with U.S. technology.

Xi Jinping and the CCP are dead serious. China’s September 3, 2025 “Victory Day” military parade in Tiananmen Square was the largest military display in CCP history and showcased a broad array of new advanced weapons systems: ICBMs, hypersonic anti-ship missiles, satellite hunter missiles, fighter jets, fourth-generation battle tanks, stealth attack drones, underwater attack drones, robotic wolves, and much more. (See full video of the parade here.) It is no secret that Xi Jinping and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) have been on a rapid, massive armaments modernization and buildup for more than a decade. This has been especially notable regarding China’s navy, which now, in terms of quantity, is the largest in the world. (In 2024, the U.S. Department of Defense reported that China’s naval fleet numbered 332 vessels compared to America’s 291). All of these advances are dependent on R&D, technology, materials, processes, education, and training provided by, or aided by, U.S. corporations and the U.S. government.

In response to the Chinese buildup, President Trump has called for an enormous military budget of $1.5 trillion for 2027, an increase of more than 50 percent over the $1 trillion 2025 budget. That includes a huge shipbuilding program and the launch of his “Golden Dome” missile defense system.

But if we continue providing Beijing with the cutting-edge technology that allows China to leapfrog over our latest weapons systems, we are trapping ourselves on a deadly treadmill that guarantees we will bankrupt America while giving the CCP eventual military dominance and global hegemony. We could spend $2 trillion, $3 trillion, or $4 trillion on new razzle-dazzle weapons systems, all to no avail if we then turn around and provide China with the technology to defeat those systems, as we have been doing for years. In 2021, we published a three-part article series on America’s suicidal technology transfers to China: China’s Tech War, China’s Chip Foundries Still Dependent on Foreign Tech Transfers, and China’s Brain: Made in USA. The evidence is crystal clear; without the continuous treasonous transfers of American technology and know-how, Xi Jinping’s jaw-dropping hi-tech weapons systems would not exist. But the madness and treason continue.

On February 9, 2026, Representative Brian J. Mast (R-Fla.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Representative John Moolenaar (R-Mich.), chairman of the House Select Committee on the CCP, sent a letter to Secretaries Rubio and Lutnick “to express our strong bipartisan support for robust export controls on semiconductor manufacturing equipment (SME) and to urge the State Department to urgently work to close the remaining critical gaps in our control regime through vigorous engagement with our allies.”

What are those critical gaps? For one, exports on SME, for example, apply only to “certain specified entities in China, rather than on a countrywide basis.” So, if one Chinese company gets blocked, there are plenty of others that are not blocked, allowing them to acquire the restricted technology.

The letter continues:

Export controls on SME represent one of America’s most significant points of leverage in our strategic competition with the People’s Republic of China. These tools are essential not only for producing the advanced AI chips that will shape the future of both economic and military power, but also for manufacturing the legacy chips that go into PLA weapons systems and intelligence platforms. Maintaining restrictions on this equipment is critical to U.S. national security….

Despite meaningful progress, however, critical gaps persist in our export control regime. Of particular concern, certain foreign-produced chokepoint SME is controlled only for certain specified entities in China, rather than on a countrywide basis. This matters because once equipment crosses the border into China, the U.S. government has extremely limited ability to enforce end-use and end-user restrictions. Verification visits require advance permission from PRC authorities, can take weeks or months to arrange, and are conducted under escort by PRC security personnel. Entity-specific controls, while valuable, cannot substitute for countrywide restrictions on the most critical chokepoint tools….

Each chokepoint tool that enters China represents a permanent loss of American leverage. Additionally, China is working to build domestic SME by exploiting access to U.S. and allied subcomponents required to produce tools, such as electrostatic chucks. Left unchecked, China could render U.S. and allied export controls irrelevant by replacing foreign chipmaking tools entirely….

The window to secure America’s semiconductor advantage is narrowing. We request a briefing within the next month on the Administration’s strategy for securing allied cooperation on countrywide controls on chokepoint semiconductor manufacturing equipment and components and the timeline for achieving this goal….

In addition to Chairmen Mast and Moolenaar, the bipartisan letter was signed by Representatives Bill Huizenga (R-Mich.), Michael Baumgartner (R-Wash.), Gregory W. Meeks (D-N.Y.), Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Calif.), Greg Stanton (D-Ariz.), and Johnny Olszewski (D-Md.).

The fact that the above-listed Democrats have joined in this commonsense appeal is encouraging. “But,” as the letter states, “time is not on our side.” Plugging the export controls is of the utmost urgency.

Last October, the House Select Committee on the CCP published a chilling report: Selling the Forges of the Future: How the CCP Gets its Key Equipment for Making Semiconductors from U.S., Dutch, and Japanese Companies. It is but one of the myriad revelations documenting the unbroken chain of betrayals that repeatedly have saved communist China from its own self-destruction and transformed it into a global menace. In our 2023 article Enemy Within the Gates we provide a condensed history of those betrayals and a warning about the dire threat these continued betrayals pose to freedoms and our very existence. — William F. Jasper

The End of New START: The Emerging Multipolar World Gives Rise to Arms Competition

On February 5, the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) expired, ending the last legally binding bilateral agreement limiting U.S. and Russian strategic nuclear forces. Signed in 2010 and extended for five years in 2021 — the maximum allowed — the treaty capped each side at 1,550 deployed strategic warheads on 700 delivery vehicles and included data exchanges and on-site inspections for verification.

Russia suspended implementation in February 2023, halting inspections and notifications while claiming it would still respect the numerical limits. In September 2025, President Vladimir Putin proposed a voluntary one-year extension of those caps, provided the United States reciprocated and refrained from actions undermining strategic stability. President Donald Trump initially called the idea promising but later rejected a formal extension, stating on Truth Social that the two sides should instead negotiate “a new, improved and modernized Treaty.” Informal talks continue, and reports indicate both sides have agreed in principle to observe the old limits “in good faith” during negotiations. However, no binding commitment or verification regime exists.

For the first time since the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks began in the early 1970s, the two largest nuclear powers — together holding roughly 85 to 90 percent of the world’s warheads — operate without treaty caps on their long-range forces. The immediate risk is not a crash arms race. Both countries are already modernizing their arsenals, and uploading additional warheads onto existing missiles and bombers is technically possible but expensive and time-consuming. Russia faces economic constraints, and the U.S. nuclear posture remains focused on replacing aging systems rather than rapid expansion.

The deeper geopolitical shift is structural. New START’s verification and dialogue mechanisms provided at least the appearance of transparency and predictability. Their absence opens the door to worst-case scenarios. At the same time, China’s nuclear buildup has fundamentally altered the equation. The Pentagon estimates Beijing’s operational warheads have grown from roughly 300 in 2020 to about 600 today, on track to reach 1,000 by 2030. U.S. planners now speak of a “two-peer” deterrence challenge (Russia plus China), while Beijing refuses trilateral talks, insisting the superpowers must first reduce to its level. The result is a more complex, three-way nuclear competition unlike the bipolar Cold War standoff.

This situation differs markedly from the post-Soviet “loose nukes” crisis of the early 1990s. The collapse of the USSR raised alarms that unsecured warheads, highly enriched uranium, plutonium, and thousands of nuclear scientists could leak onto the black market or to rogue states. The Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction program and bilateral agreements with Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan successfully repatriated or dismantled those assets. Today the danger is not state failure and proliferation by leakage, but deliberate competitive expansion among functioning great powers. The erosion of arms-control norms could still encourage secondary proliferation: non-nuclear states may question the value of nuclear proliferation treaty restraint when the recognized nuclear powers appear to be walking away from disarmament obligations. Countries in the Middle East, Northeast Asia, or Europe could reconsider their own options.

The expiration of New START therefore does not mean immediate catastrophe, but it removes guardrails at a moment when strategic rivalry is intensifying and emerging technologies (hypersonics, AI, missile defense) are complicating stability. Without a successor agreement that addresses verification, non-strategic weapons, and China’s role, the world enters a period of greater uncertainty and elevated risks — precisely the conditions that historically have driven arms races.

Most importantly, nuclear arms treaties in general undermine both U.S. national security and sovereignty. The New American has written extensively on this subject. See here, here, and here. — Rebecca Terrell

Report: National Debt Will Reach $64 Trillion in 10 Years

According to a new report, the U.S. national debt will rise to $64 trillion, up from an already whopping $38.7 trillion now.

On February 11, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released a report titled “The Budget and Economic Outlook: 2026 to 2036.” The 164-page report covers a wide range of topics related to economic growth and government spending and revenue.

The report projects that the already enormous national debt will balloon to unprecedented levels:

The large deficits over the next 10 years would lead to steady growth in federal debt held by the public. Such debt is projected to increase from 101 percent of GDP at the end of 2026 to 108 percent of GDP at the end of 2030, surpassing its previous high of 106 percent in 1946. Federal debt would equal 120 percent of GDP in 2036 and would continue to rise over the following two decades, CBO estimates.

In other words, the national debt — which is already as large as the entire U.S. economy — will soon reach the largest proportional level in U.S. history.

The report further clarifies that “gross federal debt is also projected to rise by $24 trillion over that period, reaching $64 trillion at the end of 2036.”

After 2036, the CBO’s projection grows even more dire:

Beyond the coming decade, the fiscal outlook is more uncertain. In CBO’s long-term projections, which extend through 2056, deficits increase steadily in relation to GDP under current law…. Growing debt would cause net outlays for interest to rise rapidly as a percentage of GDP over that period, from 4.6 percent in 2036 to 6.9 percent by 2056. Net interest spending in 2056 would exceed spending for both Social Security (6.0 percent of GDP) and Medicare (5.5 percent of GDP), despite increases in spending for those programs due to the aging U.S. population and growth in per capita spending on health care. Federal revenues also would increase, but they would not keep pace with outlays. As a result, CBO estimates, debt held by the public would reach 175 percent of GDP by 2056, far higher than any percentage previously recorded in the United States…

Debt is on track to grow even larger after 2056. To avoid the consequences of large and growing federal debt, lawmakers would have to make significant changes to tax and spending policies — increasing revenues, reducing spending, or adopting some combination of those approaches. The size of the policy changes needed to put debt on a sustainable path will grow the longer lawmakers wait to implement those changes.

Congress’ recent actions poured fuel on the national-debt fire. According to a February 17 analysis by The New York Times, it rejected the vast majority of spending reductions requested by the Trump administration in the 2026 federal budget — which were already insufficient — and funding for most agencies has increased. As The New American previously reported, this funding includes appropriations for refugees, abortion, and “gender procedures.”

In order to balance the federal budget, Congress must return to constitutional adherence. The U.S. Constitution restricts the federal government to a small number of enumerated powers. Every other power is reserved to the states and the people, as the 10th Amendment makes clear. As James Madison wrote in The Federalist, No. 45, “The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.” If Congress actually followed the Constitution, the size and scope of the federal government would shrink to just a fraction of what it is today.

It’s up to us to demand constitutional fidelity from our elected officials. Call and meet with your U.S. representative and senators, and urge them to solve our nation’s looming fiscal catastrophe by following the Constitution. — Peter Rykowski

NYT Admits Leftist Judges Waging Lawfare Against Trump

Jeffrey Toobin is back. Yes, that Jeffrey Toobin, the insufferably self-righteous moralist who was caught on camera in flagrante delicto during an October 2020 Zoom call with staffers for The New Yorker. His obscene behavior was a bit over the top even for The New Yorker’s liberal-lefties. He was fired from the magazine where he had been a writer since 1993. But over at CNN, where he had been a high-profile legal analyst since 2002, folks are a bit more “understanding.” CNN merely gave him a temporary suspension before bringing him back to share his supposed legal acumen, even though the perverse Zoom “event” was not his only sex scandal.

The New York Times gave the disgraced commentator prominent op-ed space on February 16 to boast about the ongoing judicial lawfare against the Trump administration. “The Plan for a Radically Different Supreme Court Is Here,” Toobin declares in his op-ed title. He goes on to trumpet the success of Biden-appointed judges in sabotaging Trump’s policies and to point out that much of the credit for that should be given to the newly elected president of the left-wing (and misnamed) American Constitution Society (ACS).

“Phil Brest,” says Toobin, “the new president of the A.C.S., which was founded in 2001, participated in a largely unsung success of Joe Biden’s presidency: Serving in Mr. Biden’s White House counsel’s office, Mr. Brest, now 38, helped the president nominate and win confirmation of 235 federal judges, which is more than Mr. Trump’s total in his first term.”

He continues:

Those judges — and others appointed by Democratic presidents — have proved that the most effective resistance to Mr. Trump has come not from Democratic politicians but rather from federal judges. In the last several weeks alone, these judges, many of them Biden appointees, have ordered the release from immigration custody of five-year-old Liam Ramos and his father and their return to their home in Minnesota; blocked the Trump administration from ending temporary protections from deportation that had been granted to thousands of Ethiopians living in the United States; and directed the Trump administration to allow members of Congress to make unannounced visits to ICE detention facilities.

That’s just for starters; the list of radical rulings is long. Attorneys of the ACLU, National Lawyers Guild, American Immigration Lawyers Association, Lambda Legal, and other organized subversives know they can bring the most outlandish cases before Clinton-Obama-Biden judges with high expectations of favorable rulings.

“In his opening message to the group, Mr. Brest described the A.C.S. as building ‘a bulwark against overreach by the Trump administration and the Roberts court,’” Toobin wrote. “Mr. Brest has pledged that A.C.S. will continue its Biden-era focus on judicial appointments.”

In other words, we should expect that the judicial coup we have been witnessing will accelerate. — William F. Jasper

Trump Administration Revokes Obama-era EPA Endangerment Finding in Largest Deregulatory Action in U.S. History

On February 12, President Donald Trump and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lee Zeldin announced the finalization of a rule rescinding the 2009 Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Endangerment Finding and eliminating all related federal GHG emission standards for motor vehicles and engines. The administration described the action as the single largest deregulatory measure in American history, projecting savings of more than $1.3 trillion for taxpayers and consumers between 2027 and 2055.

The 2009 Endangerment Finding, issued by the Obama-era EPA in December 2009, determined that six greenhouse gases — including carbon dioxide and methane — endanger public health and welfare under Section 202(a) of the Clean Air Act. That finding served as the legal foundation for more than 16 years of federal GHG regulations on vehicles, engines, and other sources, including fuel-economy mandates, electric-vehicle incentives, and off-cycle credits that manufacturers used to meet compliance targets.

In the February 12 announcement at the White House, Administrator Zeldin stated: “The Endangerment Finding has been the source of 16 years of consumer choice restrictions and trillions of dollars in hidden costs for Americans. Referred to by some as the ‘Holy Grail’ of the ‘climate change religion,’ the Endangerment Finding is now eliminated.” The rule also removes all off-cycle credits, including those tied to the widely disliked automatic start-stop technology in vehicles.

The EPA’s economic analysis estimates $1.1 trillion in savings from lower new-vehicle costs — an average of more than $2,400 per vehicle — and an additional $200 billion from avoided expenses related to electric-vehicle chargers and infrastructure. By repealing the standards, manufacturers will no longer face federal mandates to integrate specific technologies or shift production toward electric vehicles, restoring consumer choice in light-duty, medium-duty, and heavy-duty vehicles.

The rulemaking followed an extensive public process. After President Trump’s Day One executive order directing review of the finding, the EPA initiated formal reconsideration in March 2025 and proposed the rescission in July 2025. The agency received approximately 572,000 public comments and held four days of virtual hearings. The final rule cites recent Supreme Court decisions, including West Virginia v. EPA and Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, which clarified limits on agency authority and emphasized that major policy questions belong to Congress.

This could mark the unwinding of globalism and the reversal of policies put into place in the 1970s to gut America’s manufacturing sector and build out Asia. Interestingly, the EPA was created in 1970. It was tasked with identifying what gases factories emitted and then stigmatizing them as a backdoor way to inhibit industrial production. Sulfur dioxide was its first choice — later, carbon. This coincided with the Ford Foundation’s influential 1974 report A Time to Choose, overseen by McGeorge Bundy. That document framed energy conservation and reduced demand as national imperatives, implicitly endorsing the managed contraction of energy-intensive sectors such as steel, paper, and heavy manufacturing. Openly declaring an intent to offshore jobs and hollow out the industrial heartland would have been politically impossible; instead, successive layers of environmental rules on SO₂, and later on CO₂ through the endangerment finding, achieved the same result by raising compliance costs, discouraging new investment, and tilting the competitive landscape toward low-wage, lightly regulated producers in Asia. The effect was the same: American factories closed, supply chains stretched across the Pacific, and working-class communities were told the sacrifice was necessary for cleaner air and a “sustainable” planet.

With globalism now visibly fraying — exposed by pandemic supply shocks, strategic rivalry with China, and the recognition that ceding manufacturing capacity has weakened national security — the Trump administration is dismantling the regulatory architecture that facilitated that transfer of industry. By eliminating the endangerment finding and its downstream mandates, the White House is removing the backdoor economic penalties that made domestic production uncompetitive. The goal is straightforward: re-shore steel, autos, chemicals, and other core industries, restore high-wage manufacturing jobs, and rebuild the strategic industrial base the United States once took for granted. In place of the globalist model of managed decline, the new policy prioritizes American energy abundance, consumer choice, and economic sovereignty — precisely the objectives that the layered SO₂-and-carbon regime was designed to suppress. — Rebecca Terrell

Suing the Deregulators

Many Americans are celebrating the Trump administration’s announcement of the elimination of the Environmental Protection Agency’s 2009 “endangerment finding,” which claimed that six greenhouse gases, including CO₂, endangered public health.

But not all. The establishment media has portrayed the move with their characteristic “The sky is falling! The sky is falling!” narrative (or at least, the sky will fall if CO₂ emissions are not curtailed). Most recently, on February 18, the usual suspects — the American Public Health Association, American Lung Association, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Environmental Defense Fund, Sierra Club, and others — filed a suit against the EPA in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The suit claims that the Trump EPA’s recission of the endangerment finding is unlawful. Supposedly the Trump EPA cannot undo what the Obama EPA did because the U.S. Supreme Court had decided in Massachusetts v. EPA (2007) that CO₂ and other greenhouse gases qualified as pollutants under the Clean Air Act, setting the stage for the EPA’s endangerment finding two years later.

If calling CO₂ (the gas of life) a pollutant does not make sense to you, then please keep in mind that the top-down climate change agenda is about shackling planet Earth under the guise of saving it, as The New American has pointed out time and again. (e.g., see here and here). — Gary Benoit

Trump Lagging in Red-state Judicial Nominations

During his first term, President Donald Trump made judicial nominations a top priority, with the U.S. Senate confirming 234 nominees for Article III federal judges in four years. Although far fewer judicial vacancies exist a quarter of the way through his second term, Trump has yet to announce nominees for key judicial vacancies.

Bloomberg Law succinctly noted on February 13, “The White House has yet to announce nominees for district court vacancies in three states with two Republican senators as conservatives push to fill as many seats as possible before the midterm elections.”

If anything, the article understated the lack of nominations. As of February 19, these judicial vacancies without nominees include seven in Texas, as well as another 10 in Alaska, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Ohio, and Oklahoma. (These don’t include vacancies for which nominees have already been announced.) All these states have two Republican senators, theoretically removing the blue-slip obstacle for confirming nominations.

The First Liberty Institute, a conservative legal organization that advocates for religious freedom, highlighted the urgency in announcing and confirming more judicial nominees:

With the 2026 Midterm elections looming, the U.S. Senate and the administration need to move quickly to confirm judges. There’s an urgency to fill about 40 vacancies.

The results of the November election could very well close the window of opportunity to place strong, principled judges on the bench. A power shift in the U.S. Senate and divided government could stall confirmations for the rest of the President’s second term….

But with 2026 well underway, the administration is going to have to step on the gas if it’s going to reach 40 confirmations in its second year.

In a Fox News op-ed, Mike Davis of the Article III Project put the blame on Republican senators, arguing, “Many Republican senators … are lagging in streamlining nominations. The most serious breakdown is in filling district court vacancies in deep-red states, especially Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.”

Regardless of who is to blame, Republicans and the Trump administration face a rapidly closing deadline for confirming nominees for states that should theoretically be easy to fill without needing to resort to Senate rule changes. — Peter Rykowski

Global Banksters, UN Gangsters, and Net Zero Fraudsters

Last year the Net Zero Banking Alliance collapsed, to the huzzahs of taxpayers, pensioners, and freedom lovers everywhere. The NZBA was formed by globalist bankers to pressure governments and companies to adopt Net Zero policies that included abandoning/outlawing hydrocarbon fuels in favor of wind and solar. Bank of America, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, and Wells Fargo were NZBA leaders. But popular backlash, together with investigations and lawsuits by state attorneys general and opposition to Net Zero from President Trump, caused the above-named banksters to back out and abandon the alliance. (See more here, here, and here.)

But, as The New American noted at the time, the NZBA collapse was a cause for celebration, but did not signal a final end to the Public Private Partnerships funding and promoting the fraudulent wind/solar “renewables” schemes.

On February 17, 2026 the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), a branch of the World Bank Group (aka the World Bank) announced it had issued a “guarantee” to Citibank for a $198 million loan to the State Bank of India (SBI) for a rooftop solar project. The loan is to refinance a previous $500 million World Bank loan for the solar project. The World Bank, a specialized agency of the UN, pours billions of taxpayer dollars into similar projects. The MIGA press release states that “the guarantee will protect Citi against the risk of non-honoring of financial obligations by a state-owned enterprise.” So, if SBI welches on the loan, no worries for Citi because MIGA/World Bank (i.e., taxpayers) will pick up the bill. — William F. Jasper

Threats to Dollar Dominance: Sanctions, Rival Currencies, and an Emerging Multipolar World

In late January, the Communist Party’s flagship journal Qiushi printed excerpts from a previously unpublished 2024 speech by Chinese President Xi Jinping, marking his most explicit and direct call yet for the renminbi (yuan) to achieve global reserve currency status. Xi emphasized the need for China to build a “powerful currency” that is “widely used in international trade, investment, and foreign exchange markets” and ultimately holds the position of a global reserve asset, challenging the U.S. dollar’s long-standing dominance since World War II.

To place what’s happening into a larger context, consider a pattern from history: In the past, the king always had to be careful of the aristocrats in his realm because, though he was stronger than any one of them, he was weaker than all of them (if they combined against him in a coalition). Magna Carta, for instance, was an example of when King John of England in the year 1215 was bullied by the aristocrats, and they wrested power from him under threat of violence. Taking him into a clearing in the woods, they put a sword up to his throat and forced him to sign away his royal prerogative to make laws. It was transferred to the nobles, who soon after made the House of Lords. (A recurrent theme spanning many historical periods involved a king triangulating around the aristocrats by appealing to the peasants for support. Kings in Europe, for example, built “free cities,” and lured serfs off the land of aristocrats with the promise of more political rights, as a method by which to deprive the aristocrats of soldiers and tax revenue. Thus the king could counteract the aristocrats. In antiquity, they called such a king a “tyrant,” that is to say, a traitor to his own class as he aligned himself with the peasants against the aristocrats.)

The behavior of nations might be said to reflect that of individuals. In the modern era, the “king,” so to speak, might be seen as the United States. The nobles, by allegory, are the powerful First World countries. And the peasants are the Global South, whose labor, resources, and markets sustain the system but who are often exploited or courted for leverage.

Right now, a coalition of powerful countries are coming together to counteract what they see as the tyranny of the United States (which has taken to imposing sanctions on countries and digitally turning off their money — as they’ve done to Afghanistan and Russia). Fearful of the United Sates availing itself of the same technique against them, they’ve banded together as the so-called BRICS nations (an acronym made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa). BRICS has since been courting other countries to join its coalition in creating a parallel system to bypass U.S. sanctions. To do this, they need to trade outside the dollar and in their own local currencies — something that hasn’t been a global norm since the United States inaugurated the Bretton-Woods system after the Second World War.

In a candid moment on Fox News in 2023, Senator Marco Rubio highlighted a pivotal shift in global finance: “Today, Brazil … cut a trade deal with China. They’re going to, from now on, do trade in their own currencies, get right around the dollar. They’re creating a secondary economy in the world, totally independent of the United States. We won’t have to talk about sanctions in five years, because there will be so many countries transacting in currencies other than the dollar, that we won’t have the ability to sanction them.” This admission, resurfaced amid escalating U.S. tariffs in 2026, underscores a profound geopolitical transformation. As rival currencies ascend, America’s sanction leverage erodes, evoking medieval power struggles where a king must beware his nobles’ alliances. — Rebecca Terrell

Italy Proposes Anti-illegal-migration Bill, While Spain Proposes Amnesty

Italy and Spain appear to be heading in different directions regarding how to handle illegal migration.

On February 11, Italy’s cabinet under Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni approved a bill to strengthen border security, including by allowing the Navy to stop migrant ships from entering Italian waters for up to six months in certain circumstances. It needs approval from the Italian Parliament before becoming law.

The proposal comes after a referendum to allow half of Italy’s current foreign population to become citizens — which Meloni’s government opposed — failed due to low turnout.

Spain, by contrast, is moving to give amnesty to illegal migrants. In late January, the country’s left-wing government under Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced that it would provide legal status to illegal aliens who entered the country before December 31, 2025, lived in Spain for at least five months, and had no criminal record (besides entering Spain illegally). Up to 500,000 illegals are expected to receive amnesty as a result.

Although Meloni’s government has not been perfect — it has expanded foreign-worker visas and prioritized EU cooperation over national sovereignty — the actions of Italy and Spain demonstrate a wide gap within the European Union over how to respond to mass migration. — Peter Rykowski

House Passes SAVE America Act

In a landmark vote on February 11, the Republican-led House of Representatives passed the SAVE America Act (Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act), delivering a reputed victory for election security and constitutional governance. The bill, backed by President Donald Trump, passed 218-213, with unanimous Republican support and one Democrat — Henry Cuellar of Texas — joining in favor. It now awaits Senate action, where it faces the usual filibuster obstacles from those who prefer open borders and diluted sovereignty.

At its core, the SAVE America Act amends the Motor Voter Act, requiring documentary proof of U.S. citizenship — such as a passport, birth certificate, naturalization papers, or a REAL ID-compliant document explicitly indicating citizenship — when registering to vote in federal elections. It mandates a valid photo ID at the polls and directs states to cross-check voter rolls against the Department of Homeland Security’s Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) database to identify and remove non-citizens. On one hand, the act is positive, in that it helps defang the Motor Votor Act. On the negative side, it represents additional federal meddling in elections.

Provisions, however, may not take effect immediately upon enactment, due to individual states requiring time to adjust their particular voter systems to bring them into alignment with the new protocols. Advocates hope that this will close loopholes that have long allowed self-attestation under penalty of perjury to serve as the only barrier to non-citizen registration.

This is not radical. Of the 195 countries on Earth, 176 require valid ID to vote. Moreover, the Constitution reserves the franchise to American citizens. Yet for years, federal law has permitted states to register voters based on a mere checkbox and signature. In an era of record illegal immigration, the risk of non-citizen voting is no longer theoretical. Multiple investigations and audits have uncovered non-citizens on voter rolls in sanctuary jurisdictions, while lax enforcement has allowed millions of unvetted individuals into the country. The SAVE America Act is touted to restore the fundamental principle that only Americans decide American elections.

Public support is overwhelming. Polls show 80 percent or more of voters — including strong majorities of Democrats, Hispanics, and Black Americans — favor photo ID and citizenship verification. States that have implemented similar measures, such as Georgia’s voter ID law, saw record turnout and increased confidence in results, not suppression. Claims that the bill burdens married women (due to name changes) or minorities ignore reality, for states already accommodate name changes for driver’s licenses and passports. Critics’ “disenfranchisement” rhetoric is the same tired playbook used against every security reform — from Georgia’s ID law to basic border enforcement.

The legislation builds on the original SAVE Act, which passed the House in 2025 but stalled in the Senate. This updated version strengthens safeguards by incorporating photo ID nationwide and mandatory DHS database checks — tools that election officials in compliant states already use effectively. It also rejects the honor-system approach that has left the republic vulnerable to foreign influence and domestic subversion.

Democrats and allied left-wing organizations have denounced the bill as “Jim Crow 2.0,” but in fact, for every non-citizen voting, that constitutes the erasure of a lawful American vote — which represents disenfranchisement of legal U.S. citizens on a scale that dwarfs anything that ever happened during the Jim Crow era.

Though SAVE America could be considered a step in the right direct, a more constitutional option would be to halt federal interference in elections by repealing Motor Voter entirely, which Arizona Republican Andy Biggs is attempting to do by introducing H.R. 55. Contact your congressman today asking him to co-sponsor this important bill.

It’s also important to remember that none of these measures solve an underlying problem. The U.S. Census Bureau counts all residents of the United States — including foreigners in the country illegally — for the decennial census apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives. Journalist Peter Schweizer commented, “Illegal immigrants don’t need to vote to effect elections [sic]. Congressional seats are apportioned based on population — and that currently includes illegal immigrants. California has ELEVEN more congressional seats because of this.” — Rebecca Terrell

Switzerland to Vote on “No 10 Million” Immigration Proposal

Swiss voters will decide on June 14 whether to cap their country’s population at 10 million by restricting immigration.

The proposal, titled “No 10-million Switzerland,” is a popular initiative spearheaded by the conservative Swiss People’s Party (SVP). If passed, it would require the government to restrict immigration in order to prevent Switzerland’s population from surpassing 10 million before 2050. Specifically, the measure stipulates that if the country’s population surpasses 9.5 million, the government would need to restrict asylum and family reunification and renegotiate international agreements that promote mass migration. If the population exceeds 10 million, Switzerland would be required to withdraw from the UN’s Global Compact for Migration and its agreement with the European Union allowing for the free movement of people.

In December, Switzerland’s Council of States (upper house) voted 30-9 to recommend the proposal’s rejection, and the National Council (lower house) followed suit with a 123-67 vote. In March, the seven-member Federal Council (executive branch) also recommended rejecting the initiative, explaining:

The initiative explicitly demands that the Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons (AFMP) with the EU be terminated unless the population can be limited to ten million through other measures — such as the termination of human rights agreements — and unless exceptions or safeguard clauses have been negotiated or invoked by that time. Acceptance of the initiative would therefore entail a fundamental reorientation of Swiss migration policy and Swiss-EU relations, with far-reaching consequences….

An increase in the permanent resident population could necessitate the termination of a significant number of international treaties, the exact number of which has not yet been determined….

Terminating the Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons (AFMP) would fundamentally call into question the bilateral approach [with the EU]. Due to the guillotine clause, terminating the AFMP would also invalidate other internal market agreements and jeopardize the Schengen and Dublin Association Agreements.

In other words, passing this initiative would force the government to withdraw Switzerland from a growing web of sovereignty-eroding international agreements — and the Swiss political establishment would rather leave their country shackled to them.

Despite the government’s opposition to the initiative, it appears to have respectable support among the public. According to a December poll, 48 percent of Swiss voters supported the measure, while 41 percent opposed it.

This support is sensible. In the last 30 years, Switzerland’s population has increased from 7 million to more than 9 million — five times faster than the EU’s population growth, and fueled almost entirely through migration. Foreigners currently comprise more than a quarter of Switzerland’s population.

Switzerland’s system of direct democracy allows citizens and groups to force referendums on constitutional and statutory matters if they gather a certain number of signatures. As The New American has previously reported, this system is antithetical to a republican form of government that the U.S. Founding Fathers advocated.

Nonetheless, if the “No 10-million Switzerland” measure passes, it would be a major step toward restoring Switzerland’s national sovereignty and control over its national borders. Rather than seeking further integration with the EU, the country should terminate its existing treaties and agreements, and restore its historical commitment to maintaining national independence. — Peter Rykowski

The Surge of Global Uncertainty: Index Hits New High

In February, the World Uncertainty Index (WUI) shattered records, climbing to an unprecedented 106,862. This figure eclipses previous peaks during the Covid era (where it peaked at approximately 56,000 in March of 2020), the 2008 financial crisis (where it was roughly 30,000), and the 9/11 attacks (where it hovered around 15,000), signaling a profound escalation in global economic anxiety. Developed by economists at the Economist Intelligence Unit, the WUI measures uncertainty by tracking the frequency of related terms in country reports across more than 140 nations. The current spike is primarily fueled by intensifying trade policy risks, including U.S. tariffs and retaliatory measures, alongside geopolitical tensions such as conflicts in Ukraine, the Middle East, and rising U.S.-China frictions. These factors have threatened to disrupt supply chains, inflate costs, and erode investor confidence, with projections indicating subdued global GDP growth at around 2.7 percent for the year.

Economists warn that this uncertainty could delay investments, slow hiring, and dampen consumer spending, potentially dragging down growth for six to 18 months. Paradoxically, stock markets such as the NASDAQ and S&P 500 have hit highs, while safe-havens such as gold surged past $5,500 per ounce, highlighting a disconnect between the market and underlying signals.

Coincidentally, this turmoil aligns with forecasts from economist Martin Armstrong, whose Economic Confidence Model (ECM) identifies 2026 as a pivotal year in its 8.6-year cycles — derived from pi multiplied by 1,000 days (approximately 3,141 days). Armstrong’s model, which layers these cycles into longer waves such as 51.6 years, anticipates a “panic cycle” in 2026, marked by sovereign debt stresses, stagflation in the United States, and potential depressions in Europe. He views 2026 as a turning point escalating from 2025’s volatility toward broader instability by 2030.

Armstrong’s track record bolsters this outlook. He accurately predicted the 1987 Black Monday crash to the day, the 1989 Nikkei peak, and the 1998 Russian financial collapse. More recently, his model flagged the 2020 Covid market downturn and even anticipated Brexit and Trump’s 2016 victory. These successes stem from his emphasis on cyclical patterns in human behavior, markets, and geopolitics, rather than linear trends.

The WUI’s surge aligns eerily with Armstrong’s cycles, suggesting that trade wars and geopolitical strife may be manifestations of deeper forces. As uncertainty peaks, his model warns of a shift from controlled conflicts, urging preparedness amid potential economic upheaval. — Rebecca Terrell