Trump

White House Considers Taking Billions from Harvard; Giving to Trade Schools Instead

The White House has declared it is considering taking $3 billion in federal funds away from Harvard University, which rests on a fat $53.2 billion endowment – the largest in the world – and giving the money to trade schools in order to educate working class Americans in meaningful, highly productive trades.

On Sunday morning, the White House posted:

Focus on the Family and Daily Citizen strongly applaud this policy proposal. The reason is simple. Getting young men good paying jobs is fundamental for good family formation. Many young women will tell you that they are having a hard time finding marriageable men. Men will tell you they are disinclined to seek a wife when they do not have the means to support her and children.

Recent research conducted jointly at Yale, Cornell and Harvard notes that “economic outcomes for other non-college men have sharply declined, accompanied by a drop in marriage rates for non-college women.” These women are not likely to marry men who have no or very little real career prospects.

It has long been documented how workforce participation among men has been declining in our nation. You can see the declining trend line for male employment in the United States here. It is not an encouraging picture.

In a 2022 update to his very important book, Men Without Work, American Enterprise scholar Nicholas Eberstadt explains,

Job openings so exceed the ranks of America’s un-working prime-age men (those twenty-five to fifty-four neither working nor looking for work) that every member of this idle army could be placed in a job, and there would still be more than 3.9 million jobs awaiting candidates

He adds, “The average monthly work rate for prime-age men is lower that it was in March 1940.” We are currently doing worse than Depression-era employment for able-bodied men. That is a national tragedy.

The power of trade schools are a secret weapon in helping young men gain the confidence, skills and income they need to make them a more attractive mates to young women. While serving as a U.S. senator from Florida, Marco Rubio released an important 2023 report entitled “The State of the Working (and Non-Working) Man.” In that report, he warned that in order to prepare the next generation of American men to engage in civic and employment life, we must “change teaching practices, encourage marriage, and connect young men with vocational training and jobs.”

He added, “The federal government spends about $175 billion each year supporting postsecondary education and a tiny fraction of that amount on vocational education and training.” Our nation should be pumping a large portion of the billions it contributes to college education into helping young men learn powerful vocational and technical skills that could rebuild their confidence, launch new and meaningful trade careers and help establish new marriages and families, thus giving rebirth to our nation.

Marco Rubio contends, “The results could be transformational.” We think he is right, and we strongly support the president’s new announcement to put more national support behind vocational and technical training for men and women.

Image from Shutterstock.

President Donald Trump, First Lady Sign ‘Take It Down’ Act

President Donald Trump signed the Take It Down Act into law today.

The legislation targets nonconsensual sharing of nude and explicit images online.

“This will be the first ever federal law to combat the distribution of explicit images posted without subject’s consent,” Mr. Trump spoke alongside First Lady Melania Trump at Monday’s signing ceremony.

“We will not tolerate online exploitation.”

The Take It Down Act targets three common kinds of online exploitation — “revenge porn,” explicit AI-deepfakes and sextortion — by making it illegal to share, or threaten to share, explicit images of a person online without their permission.

Penalties apply equally to real and AI-generated images.

“With the rise of AI image generation, women have been harassed with deepfakes and other explicit images distributed against their will,” the President addressed AI abuse specifically.

“It’s just so horribly wrong … Today, we’re making it totally illegal.”

Focus on the Family’s Vice President of External Relations, Tim Goeglein, attended the ceremony on Focus’ behalf.

“Those of us at Focus on the Family in Washington have championed this outstanding legislation from the beginning,” he told the Daily Citizen, expounding:

The strength of this law is that it builds in real safeguards for people who have been immeasurably damaged and hurt.
Although it doesn’t happen very often in Washington, it was heartening that so many members of Congress worked together in a bipartisan manner to get this over the finish line.

First Lady Melania Trump, who helped shepherd the Take It Down Act through Congress, also thanked Congressmembers for putting politics aside in favor of passing the bill. She signed the legislation after the president, who thanked her for her leadership.

“America is blessed to have such a dedicated and compassionate first lady,” he praised.

The Take It Down Act helps parents protect their children in what can often feel like a lawless online universe. The Daily Citizen is grateful for the first family’s leadership and legislators’ willingness to pass family-first legislation.

To learn more about the Take It Down Act, and why its so important, click on our coverage below.

Additional Articles and Resources

First Lady Melania Trump Celebrates House’s Passage of Take it Down Act

First Lady Melania Trump Celebrates Committee passage of Bill Targeting Revenge Porn, Sextortion and Explicit Deepfakes

First Lady Supports Bill Targeting Deepfakes, Sextortion and Revenge Porn

Teen Boys Falling Prey to Financial Sextortion — Here’s What Parents Can Do

Meta Takes Steps to Prevent Kids From Sexting

Instagram’s Sextortion Safety Measures — Too Little, Too Late?

Zuckerberg Implicated in Meta’s Failures to Protect Children

Instagram Content Restrictions Don’t Work, Tests Show

‘The Dirty Dozen List’ — Corporations Enable and Profit from Sexual Exploitation

Taylor Swift Deepfakes Should Inspire Outrage — But X Isn’t to Blame

The Meaning Behind This Photo Hung Outside the Oval Office

Josh McPherson is lead pastor of preaching and vision at Grace City Church in Wenatchee, Washington. Josh and his wife, Sharon, along with nine other families, helped plant the congregation in 2008.

According to its website, Grace City “Exists to help more people meet, love, and follow Jesus … so that lives and legacies might be transformed as more people know God, live free, and do good in the world God made.”

On a recent episode of a podcast that Pastor McPherson cohosts with Pastor Josh Howerton of Lakepointe Church in Rockwall, Texas, the two men were joined by two other pastors to discuss their recent visit to the White House for the National Day of Prayer.

Pastors who chose to accept President Donald Trump’s invitation to the May 1st event have been criticized by some of the predictable antagonists. On this “Resurge” podcast, the pastors spoke openly and candidly about why such critique was not only misplaced but also flat out wrong.

These ministers rightly believe that it’s not partisan to pray or support policies that are biblical. As they note, it’s not about aligning with a political party – it’s about aligning with God’s moral law.

Pastor McPherson said he wanted to share some of the behind-the-scenes observations of the day, and he specifically delved into the extensive evangelical presence and energy in this current administration.

After ceremonies in the Rose Garden, McPherson and several pastors were taken into the West Wing. They were shown a large photograph that hangs just outside the Oval Office, right by a couch where dignitaries sit before meeting with the president. In his own words, here is how Pastor McPherson described the experience:

We turn around and not 10 feet away was a huge picture of President Trump sitting at the Resolute Desk with about 30 pastors …

The pastors were told the president asked for the photo to be hung there because he wants guests who enter the Oval Office to know they’re not just dealing with a man. Pastor McPherson added:

That’s not a power trip. That’s a statement that says we are a Christian nation and we want to align ourselves with the principles of God. We’re going to seek the help of God, the power of God, the leading of God in all that we do.
And when you go in the Oval Office, the most powerful man in there is not the president. It’s God himself. And that just spoke to me deeply.

The pastors went on to discuss how the apostle Paul expended considerable effort engaging the political leaders of the day. He did this because he knew how culture works. If you can positively influence top leadership, if you can introduce the Savior of the world to those in significant positions of authority, those people downstream from the leaders will inevitably benefit in countless spiritual ways.

Religious Liberty is the Preserver to Keep America Afloat

At an ecumenical prayer breakfast in Dallas back in 1984, President Ronald Reagan said,

“Without God, there is no virtue, because there’s no prompting of the conscience. Without God, we’re mired in the material, that flat world that tells us only what the senses perceive. Without God, there is a coarsening of the society. And without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure. If we ever forget that we’re one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under.”

Those words swirled in my head, as I had the honor to attend the Rose Garden ceremony as President Donald Trump announced the formation of a presidential commission to protect religious liberty. The commission members are:

Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, chair
Dr. Ben Carson, vice chair
Ryan Anderson
Bishop Robert Barron
Carrie Boller
Cardinal Timothy Dolan, archbishop of New York
Rev. Franklin Graham
Allyson Ho
Dr. Phil McGraw
Eric Metaxas
Kelly Shackelford
Rabbi Meir Soloveichik
Pastor Paula White

In his executive order announcing the commission, Trump stated,

“It shall be the policy of the executive branch to vigorously enforce the historic and robust protections for religious liberty enshrined in Federal law.  The Founders envisioned a Nation in which religious voices and views are integral to a vibrant public square and human flourishing and in which religious people and institutions are free to practice their faith without fear of discrimination or hostility from the Government.”

The commission will protect parental rights, conscience and school choice. It will also address anti-religious bias and government overreach and advise the White House on policies to safeguard religious liberty.

The present struggle over religious liberty, and the need for such a commission, boils down to two competing sides. The first side believes they have a fundamental right protected by the First Amendment to practice their faith freely and openly in society. The second believes religious liberty is not a fundamental right, and any mention or practice of faith in the public square is a dangerous conflation of church and state.

Unfortunately, for the past 60 plus years, any public display of faith by an individual or community – prayers by elected officials, religious content in public schools, and many other expressions of religious conviction – has come under attack.

The result has been, as Reagan so eloquently noted, a coarsening of society with Americans now warring against each other rather than standing together in a common bond of unity, regardless of their faith.

If there is a real attack on democracy, it is because of this lack of respect for religious liberty.

President John Adams warned us of this in 1798 when he told the Militia of Massachusetts: “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

Daniel Mark, an assistant professor of political science at Villanova University and an Orthodox Jew, understands this. He has written that religious freedom is under attack because traditional beliefs are a threat to radical autonomy. He concluded: “We need to discover – or recover – a proper account of rights. This begins with a proper grasp of the good of religion, and finally, all of the goods that constitute human flourishing.”

Or in the words of another great American, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, in his 1953 inaugural address:

“We who are free must proclaim anew our faith. This faith is the abiding creed of our fathers. It is our faith in the deathless dignity of man, governed by eternal moral and natural laws. This faith defines our full view of life. It establishes, beyond debate, those gifts of the Creator that are man’s inalienable rights, and that make all men equal in His sight.”

He then added a short sentence that succinctly sums up our nation’s current state: “A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both.”

It is no coincidence that the roots of our present poisonous public discourse can be traced to the abandonment of religious liberty. If we are to preserve our fragile union, it is critical that we set aside our differences and restore religious liberty for all. Otherwise, as Adams, Eisenhower and Reagan warned us, we will lose it all.

That is why I see the establishment of this commission by President Trump as a hopeful first step to bringing about that restoration so that we can once again, be “One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Gen Z Women Rejected Pro-Abortion Messaging in 2024, Election Data Shows

Post-election data shows pro-abortion messaging failed to galvanize young women in the 2024 election cycle, suggesting Gen Z women care far less about — or for — pro-abortion policies than political strategists expected.

It’s big news — but pollsters, per usual, are missing the point.

David Shor, head data scientist at a prominent Democrat consulting firm, joined The New York Times’ Ezra Klein last week to break down last year’s decisive presidential election. The two acknowledged young voters became more conservative but, like most analysts, attributed the shift primarily to young men.

It’s true: men aged 18 to 29 moved further right then their female counterparts — about 15 points, according to Tufts University’s Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE).

But Gen Z women also became significantly more conservative. More than 40% of women aged 18 to 29 voted Republican in 2024, compared to just 33% in the 2020 presidential election. The shift spanned races, with white and black women each moving six points to the right and latina women moving 10 points.

This rightward shift is particularly important because, unlike young men, young women were supposed to be a shoo-in for former Vice President Kamala Harris. In a May 2024 piece for The New York Times, two political analysts predicted young women would overwhelmingly support abortion “rights.”

The article, titled “[Abortion] is the Democrats’ Best Shot in 2024. And They’re Spending Like Crazy on It,” reads:

There’s a good chance the [abortion] issue could offset President Biden’s weakness among many young and nonwhite voters, given the strong turnout among women and younger voters in recent years in states where abortion rights were on the ballot.

Pro-abortion candidates leaned hard into this perceived advantage. The Democratic National Committee (DNC) and its allies spent $175 million on pro-abortion TV ads in 2024 — more than 30% of their total ad spending.

Just one day before the election, Politico reported Harris’ pro-abortion media campaign was “helping her close the gap with Trump on handling voters’ No. 1 issue: the economy.”

 “Abortion rights and Trump’s history of misogynistic statements is fueling a historic gender gap,” it further assessed, implying that women would vote on abortion and men on the economy.

These predictions did not come true. Abortion was not a mobilizing issue for American voters, particularly compared to the economy. In one of Shor’s surveys asking voters to rank issues by importance, 79% of respondents ranked the “cost of living, inflation” as more important than abortion.

Abortion paled in comparison to the economy even among Gen Z women, who are frequently portrayed as abortion’s biggest advocates. In the CIRCLE survey, 39% of women aged 18 to 29 identified “the economy and jobs” as their top policy priority.

Only 17% listed “abortion.”

The data is clear: the Democrat party spent big on an issue women, particularly young women, didn’t care about nearly as much as it thought. It effectively reduced an entire voting block to a stereotype — a caricature of an activist who cares about nothing more than having sex with no strings attached

This misunderstanding was so foundational that the party poured money into it until the bitter end. Democrats spent more than $2 million in mid-October on last minute pro-abortion messaging in swing states, even after polls showed women valued economic policy more highly.

But pro-abortion messaging clearly isn’t the silver bullet the Democrat party believed it to be.

Additional Articles and Resources

Harris’ Abortion Issue Bid Fails

Young People on the Pro-Life Movement’s Future

Young Person Talks to Young People at National March for Life