Democrats won’t concede a defeat in the 2024 election.

President Joe Biden’s Jan. 5 address at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, heralded the Democrats’ much-predicted decision to switch the focus of the president’s reelection campaign from “Bidenomics” to the one theme that has been a winner for them in the last two years: Democrats helped stave off disaster in the 2022 midterms (they lost the House but held the Senate) by declaring that the only way to save American “democracy” was to defeat former President Donald Trump and Republicans.

The speech was a predictable example of Biden’s hyperbole and bluster. He waved the proverbial “bloody shirt” of Jan. 6, 2021, and invoked the specter of a president and party that supported a so-called insurrection. He linked Trump not just to the Capitol rioters but to Russian President Vladimir Putin (a not-so-subtle invocation of the Russian-collusion conspiracy theory) and also to King George III. And he dropped George Washington’s name so often it seemed as if Biden was saying the choice was not so much between himself and Trump but between the 45th president and the first.

But one didn’t have to read between the lines of Biden’s speech to understand that — whatever one might think of Trump’s own brand of bluster and hyperbole — much of this argument was not just hypocritical but pure projection. As has been apparent ever since Democrats immediately began rebranding the Capitol riot as an “insurrection,” this is all a cover for their plans to ensure they can’t lose the 2024 election. It is also laying the groundwork for an insurrection — which they’d depict as a defense of “democracy” rather than an example of Jan. 6-like “treason” — if they do lose. Read Full Story

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• Washington Examiner: Rep. Roy Doesn’t Rule Out Ousting Speaker Mike Johnson
• The Hill: 5 things to Know About Speaker Johnson’s Spending Deal With Democrats
• Townhall: House Republican to Introduce Articles of Impeachment Against Austin
• PJ Media: Bombshell About Jan. 6 Might Make You Rethink Everything

House Republicans are beginning a crucial election year with a heightened focus on border issues, as negotiations in the Senate on asylum policy changes drag on and the conference prepares to bring impeachment proceedings against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. 

House Republicans are planning a trip to the border on Wednesday, with 60 members expected to join Speaker Mike Johnson on the visit to Eagle Pass, Texas. 

Republicans have long made migration issues central to their messaging efforts, even passing a sweeping package last year, the H.R. 2 Secure the Border bill, that includes limits on asylum eligibility and restarts border wall construction. Read Full Story

• PJ Media: There Was a Time When Governments Tried to Make Their People Better
• Washington Examiner: Thomas Massie: House Will Have Final Say Over Trump 2024 Election Ballots
• American Greatness: The Utter Insanity of Joe Biden’s Open Border
• American Thinker: America’s New Arrivals Now Stage ‘Bogus Robberies’ to Cheat System
• The Daily Caller: Dates to Know for Jam-Packed Election Year in 2024

The new year will begin with a slate of special elections that could shift the balance of power in the House ahead of the 2024 November elections. 

Several incumbents have announced their early retirements from the House, opening up seats that must be filled just as the 2024 congressional cycle gets underway. Voters will also be deciding who will fill the seat Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., occupied before lawmakers voted to expel him. 

The governors in New York, California, and Ohio will schedule special elections to fill the vacancies currently held by three Republicans and one Democrat. Read Full Story

• PJ Media: Secretary of State Blinken in Mexico City to Discuss Massive Migrant Surge
• The Hill: NY Lawmaker: Talks Between Biden Officials, Mexico ‘Too Little, Too Late’
• The Federalist: By Trying to Keep Trump Off Ballot, Democrats Staging a Coup in Broad Daylight
• The Washington Times: Senate Democrats Bristle at Campaigning With Unpopular Biden for Reelection Bids
• American Greatness: Colorado GOP Takes Appeal of Trump Ballot Ban to Supreme Court