White House defends freedom of expression, London is livid, and Milei teases reclaiming the territory.

The World Cup semifinal match between Argentina and England is still reverberating, and not only for the UK’s frustration for wasting the chance to ‘bring the cup home’, as their only 1966 title is now just a distant memory.

All around the British islands, they are seething about Argentina players displaying a banner, during their victory celebrations, that read: ‘The Malvinas (Falklands) are Argentine’.

NEW: Keir Starmer hits back at Argentina after their players held a “Falklands are Argentine” banner

“The World Cup might not have been ours but the Falklands Islands are” pic.twitter.com/4M5lOAdGJ0

— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) July 16, 2026

The UK is demanding a FIFA inquiry into the banner incident.

“A top U.K. minister is calling on FIFA to investigate the ‘entirely inappropriate’ banner unfurled by some of Argentina’s players after their World Cup victory against England.

Peter Kyle, the business secretary, told Times Radio on Thursday that he hopes world football’s governing body will ‘do a proper inquiry’ into the incident involving the sign, which read ‘Las Malvinas son Argentinas’ — which translates to ‘The Falkland Islands are Argentine’.

The call for an inquiry was reiterated by Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s spokesperson Thursday morning. She told reporters: ‘The World Cup might not be ours, but the Falkland Islands definitely are’.”

NEW: The White House has backed Argentina after their players held up a banner saying the “Falklands are Argentine”

“We believe in our First Amendment rights here in the US” pic.twitter.com/z4u9G8JKF7

— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) July 17, 2026

This comes in the wake of the White House defending the Argentine players’ banner.

The Telegraph reported:

“The White House has defended the right of Argentina’s footballers to lay claim to the Falkland Islands following their 2-1 semi-final victory against England.

Andrew Giuliani, the head of the White House Fifa task force, said the players were well within their rights to unfurl a banner that translated as “The Malvinas are Argentine” as they celebrated the win on Wednesday.

‘We believe in our First Amendment rights here in the United States of America’, Mr. Giuliani said during a briefing on Friday, referring to the American right to free speech. ‘And in terms of the ability, the opportunity to be able to make statements, [Argentina] has the ability to do that in the United States of America’.

Argentine politicians stoked tensions around the decades-long row over the territory in the build-up to the match and have since seized on the victory to renew their claim to the British overseas territory.”

A video has been circulating of the Argentina national team chanting about the Falkland War in the dressing room directed at England following their 3–2 victory over Egypt.

FIFA prohibits the display of slogans or chanting of political messages during its tournaments, but…

— The Touchmine | (@TouchmineX) July 12, 2026

Adding more fuel to the fire, Argentine President Javier Milei declared that his government is ‘getting closer every day’ to recovering sovereignty over the Falkland Islands.

Politico reported:

“Writing on X, Milei mocked Britain’s reaction to the albicelestes’ post-match celebrations. ‘While some are busy throwing tantrums befitting a terminally mononeuronal teenager, we, through the diplomatic route, are getting closer every day to the recovery of the Malvinas Islands, Georgias, and South Sandwich Islands, and the surrounding maritime space’, he wrote. […] Ahead of the match, Argentine Vice President Victoria Villarruel had described Britain as ‘usurping pirates’.

FIFA said Thursday that its independent disciplinary committee was reviewing the match reports and the circumstances surrounding the incident before deciding whether to open disciplinary proceedings. Argentina’s football association was fined in 2014 after displaying the same slogan before a friendly match against Slovenia.

The Falklands, known in Argentina as the Malvinas, have remained at the center of a sovereignty dispute for decades. Britain and Argentina fought a brief war over the South Atlantic archipelago in 1982, after which London remained in control of the islands.

Milei also defended Argentina’s players, calling their banner a legitimate expression of national feeling. ‘The Malvinas are Argentine, we are going to recover them and we are going to do it at the diplomatic level’, the president told Radio El Observador.”

Read more:

From the ‘Hand of God’ to the Falklands War: World Cup Semifinals Match Between England and Argentina Turns Into a Geopolitical Battle

The post WORLD CUP CONTROVERSY: Argentine Players’ Banner Demanding Return of Falkland Islands Puts South American Country, the US and the UK in a Geopolitical Clash appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

President Trump on Friday vowed to hold Canada responsible for the “filthy, polluted, and unhealthy air” as smog and air pollution sweep across the Northern US.

“They are not properly maintaining their Forests and Brush therein, and the United States is being unnecessarily invaded by filthy, polluted, and unhealthy air, the quality of which is dangerous and totally unacceptable!” Trump said.

“Canada has refused to engage in basic Forest Management and Debris Removal, knowing that such refusal will lead to exactly this result. This is Willful Negligence, and becoming a yearly occurrence, costing the United States Billions of Dollars, which cost of this pollution must of necessity be added to the TARIFFS Canada is currently paying,” the President said.

Nearly 900 fires are raging across Canada, bringing dangerous air quality to US states and major cities, including Washington, DC.

Canadian firefighters are attempting to extinguish the massive blazes, sending the smoke south into over a dozen US states.

Via Fox:

DC Mayor Muriel Bowser warned on Friday that older adults, children, “pregnant people,” and individuals with heart or lung diseases are most at risk from the unsafe air in the Capital.

Air quality in Washington, DC is unsafe right now, especially for sensitive groups.

Groups at highest risk include:

• Older adults (over age 65)
• Children
• Pregnant people
• Those who have heart disease, asthma, or other chronic lung disease

— Mayor Muriel Bowser (@MayorBowser) July 17, 2026

More from NBC 4:

The New York Times reported,

A plume of dense wildfire smoke stretched into the U.S. capital on Friday, as some of the worst air pollution on record in Washington blotted out the view of its stately monuments. Emergency rooms across the Northeast noted a spike in patients, and cities including Detroit handed out filtration masks as breathing outdoors remained unhealthy for tens of millions across North America.

Blazes continued to spread out of control across parts of central Canada and the boundary waters of northern Minnesota, with little sign that they would wane anytime soon. The authorities reported more than 20 new wildfires emerging overnight in the Canadian province of Ontario, where 191 were burning as of Friday morning.

Advancing weather systems are expected to help sweep away some of the stifling heat and smoke from the worst-hit parts of the United States on Friday, at least for a little while, including in Toledo, Detroit, Milwaukee and New York City. But smoke could return to those same places this weekend.

President Trump wrote in a Truth Social post on Friday,

The post Trump Says He’s Holding Canada Responsible for Wildfires and Dangerous Air Quality Levels for Millions in US Cities – Says Cost of Air Pollution Will Be Added to Tariffs appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

The radical left-wing takeover of our judiciary has reached a terrifying new low.

In a shocking and utterly unhinged ruling issued on Wednesday, the Hawaii Supreme Court has launched a direct, disgraceful assault on the United States Supreme Court.

In the case of Granillo v. State of Hawaii, authored by activist Associate Justice Todd Eddins, the rogue state court went completely off the rails.

In May 1989, Daniel R. Granillo was accused of abducting Laura Price (a pseudonym) from a Maui shopping center parking lot after her boyfriend abandoned her. Price testified that Granillo grabbed her, held a knife to her neck, drove her to the Kahului breakwater, and sexually assaulted her, forcing oral sex and digital penetration. She escaped by jumping from the moving car, flagged down help, and was found hysterical, dirty, with messy hair and later bruises on her face, thigh, and arm.

Granillo was convicted in July 1990 on kidnapping, two counts of first-degree sexual assault, and attempted first-degree sexual assault. He received 40 years. The prosecution’s case rested heavily on Price’s testimony, but they bolstered it with “uncontroverted physical evidence” from FBI hair and fiber expert Wayne Oakes.

Oakes testified that a hair found in Granillo’s car was “consistent with” coming from Price and had been forcibly removed. Fibers from Price’s underwear and pants were “consistent with” Granillo’s car seat cover and floor carpet. The prosecution hammered this in closing: physical evidence proved Price was in the car with her pants on, then off, while Granillo assaulted her. The jury convicted.

For decades, this was standard, accepted forensic science. Courts across America, including Hawaii’s own precedent in State v. Fukusaku (1997), treated microscopic hair and fiber comparison as reliable.

In 2017, the DOJ notified Hawaii prosecutors that the FBI had reviewed old cases and found Oakes’ testimony overstated the science. The 2009 National Research Council report and 2016 PCAST report had concluded that microscopic hair and fiber analysis can only provide class-level associations — not individual identification. No more “consistent with originating from” a specific person to the exclusion of others.

Granillo filed a post-conviction petition. The Hawaii Supreme Court didn’t just apply normal standards. It created/expanded a broad “false evidence” rule under the state constitution’s due process clause, held that prosecutorial knowledge of the falsity isn’t required, found a “reasonable possibility” the testimony contributed to conviction, and ordered a new trial.

The left-wing majority used their official state opinion to paint the conservative majority of the U.S. Supreme Court as literal enemies of constitutional rights and presumptive racists.

This is a complete breakdown of the rule of law.

In the blistering 91-page opinion, Justice Eddins and his woke cohorts declared that Hawaii interprets its constitution “independently, untethered from the Supreme Court’s analysis of the United States Constitution.” They chose to treat the landmark rulings of the highest court in the land as nothing more than “white noise.”

Below are some of the opinions and politically charged attacks on the United States Supreme Court:

Page 74

“The Supreme Court’s imperious ideology does not stop at due process. The same jurisprudence has cratered democracy itself.

Start with the Voting Rights Act.

The Roberts Court did what Congress never would. It rewrote the Voting Rights Act of 1965, a cornerstone of American civil rights, democratically enacted and repeatedly reauthorized. Shelby County v. Holder, began the judicial demolition, inventing a textually unsupported equal-sovereignty fiction and striking down preclearance on a hunch that the law worked too well. Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee,fabricated ‘guideposts’ nowhere in Section 2 to greenlight racial discrimination in voting. Louisiana v. Callais, buried what remained of the crown jewel of the civil rights movement. Pretend law for a real statute.

The Court then ditched its own thirty-two day default for releasing decisions and hustled out its judgment mid-primary, a favor granted over objection only twice in twenty-five years.”

Page 75

“The Roberts Court sees only white. It refuses to acknowledge who the Equal Protection Clause was written to protect. The freed people, their descendants, and all others denied equal citizenship. U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1.

It turns its back on what is in plain sight. The Fourteenth Amendment is not colorblind. It never was.

The Court calls the Constitution colorblind while engineering the dilution of Black votes, the unraveling of hard-fought civil rights remedies, and the erasure of Black history.”

Page 76

“That is not blindness. That is white sight, by design.

A Constitution interpreted this way is not colorblind. It is whatever the Court needs it to be. A way to advance its partisan project.”

Page 77

“Last month, Nat’l Republican Senatorial Comm. v. Fed. Election Comm’n, 609 U.S. ___ (June 30, 2026), made Citizens United look quaint, shredding coordinated spending limits Congress had enacted, and ensuring that those who bankroll elections drown out the ordinary person. Billionaires spend to be repaid. Everyone else just votes. The Roberts Court has made sure one’s wealth counts more than another’s vote.

Rulings run in one direction, time after time. Weakening protections for those with less power. Fortifying those with more. The pattern speaks for itself. A court that systematically dismantles democratic safeguards, steamrolls constitutional liberties, and tramples human dignity does not chart the course for the Hawaiʻi Constitution.

…

A Supreme Court driven by agenda and intent on swiping power that belongs to the people is exactly what that check was built for.”

Page 78

“When six justices walk away from those they are supposed to protect, state constitutions hold the line. That is not defiance. That is the design.

State constitutionalism makes it easy to consider Roberts Court jurisprudence ‘white noise.’

Add it all up. Draining due process. Rolling back voting rights. Flooding elections with money. Rubber-stamping gerrymandering. Crowning a president. Blessing discrimination in the name of the Constitution.

Looking at naked racism and seeing none of it. Mullin v. Doe, (racist words not ‘overtly racial’).

Making the country more dangerous with a Second Amendment unmoored from text or history and unrecognizable to the framers who wrote it. New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen; Wilson, 154 Hawaiʻi at 22, (‘disabl[ing] the states’ responsibility to protect public safety, reduce gun violence, and safeguard peaceful public movement’ with its deadly jurisprudence).

Then striking down a careful law and showing disdain for Hawaiʻi’s constitutional traditions.

ALOHA means hello, goodbye and evidently judicial insurrection.

The Hawaii Supreme Ct just published a political manifesto masquerading as a judicial opinion. It calls SCOTUS racist, treats its rulings as “white noise” and declares itself beyond federal instruction. https://t.co/lw3wpXjLfI

— Eric Schmitt (@Eric_Schmitt) July 17, 2026

The post UNHINGED: Far-Left Hawaii Supreme Court Issues Disgraceful Attack On SCOTUS – Calls Roberts Court Racist, Treats Landmark Rulings as “White Noise,” Declares Itself Beyond Federal Instruction appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

FBI Director Kash Patel announced a massive, high-stakes tactical operation in California’s Shasta-Trinity National Forest that successfully neutralized a dangerous hostage crisis.

Two U.S. Forest Service biologists conducting fieldwork near Gumboot Lake were approached by 49-year-old Joseph Charles Henrichsen and his adult son, Phoenix Henrichsen, KTVU reported.

The biologists were zip-tied and held captive inside a trailer at gunpoint. Joseph Henrichsen was armed with an AR-15-style rifle and knives and claimed to possess grenades. He reportedly demanded to speak with the FBI.

Local Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office deputies alerted federal partners. The FBI Sacramento Field Office responded rapidly with Crisis Negotiators, SWAT Team, and Evidence Response Team.

A tactical deployment of the elite Hostage Rescue Team (HRT) from Quantico, Virginia, was brought in to handle the dynamic situation.

U.S. Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz was in direct contact with Director Patel and the White House throughout the ordeal to ensure maximum support for the safe return of the employees.

Schultz later stated the experience had been “frightening” for everyone involved and expressed deep gratitude for the teamwork that brought his people home unharmed.

After nearly 10 hours of tense negotiations, the two hostages were safely released. Joseph Henrichsen and Phoenix Henrichsen surrendered without further incident and were immediately taken into custody. They now face federal charges of kidnapping federal employees.

The motive for the kidnapping has not yet been publicly disclosed, and investigators say the case remains active.

FBI Director Kash Patel posted on X:

“Yesterday and into the early morning hours of today, the FBI responded to a hostage situation in Shasta-Trinity National Forest in Redding, CA – where two individuals took two U.S. Forest Service biologists as hostages. FBI Sacramento, including our Crisis Negotiators, SWAT Team, and Evidence Response Team all arrived on scene, including a tactical deployment of our Hostage Rescue Team from Quantico.

After nearly 10 hours of negotiations, the hostages were safely released – and subjects Joseph Henrichsen and Phoenix Henrichsen surrendered and were immediately taken into custody. I am proud of the immediate and professional work of these elite FBI teams to assist our partners for a safe and successful resolution.”

Yesterday and into the early morning hours of today, the FBI responded to a hostage situation in Shasta-Trinity National Forest in Redding, CA – where two individuals took two U.S. Forest Service biologists as hostages.

FBI Sacramento, including our Crisis Negotiators, SWAT… pic.twitter.com/yOZxLrewJ2

— FBI Director Kash Patel (@FBIDirectorKash) July 18, 2026

The post Two U.S. Forest Service Biologists Freed Safely After Armed Father-Son Duo Takes Them Hostage in California — Kash Patel Praises “Elite FBI Teams” After Dramatic 10-Hour Standoff appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

WATCH: The Most Important Part of Trump’s Election Speech Was Overlooked

Newly released intelligence documents are raising explosive questions about how much the Chinese Communist Party attempted to interfere in the 2020 presidential election—and whether members of the American intelligence community prevented the allegations from being fully investigated.

The latest episode of The Patriot Perspective examines files describing an alleged Chinese operation intended to damage President Donald Trump politically and prevent his reelection.

One CIA report outlined China’s broader objective as leveraging domestic and foreign groups opposed to Trump to reduce his support, pressure him to resign, or stop him from winning another term. 

Although the intelligence did not conclusively establish that China changed the election’s outcome, the documents depict a foreign adversary determined to exploit America’s political divisions.

The most alarming material concerns the collection of Americans’ personal information.

According to newly released records, Chinese-linked operatives obtained more than 220 million American voter records totaling approximately 45 gigabytes. The information reportedly included names, addresses, telephone numbers, political affiliations, and other details potentially useful for political targeting or voter registration activities. 

The files describe the breach as possibly the largest compromise of American election data in history and indicate that China assigned a specialized data-exploitation unit to the project.

A separate raw FBI intelligence report described an alleged scheme in which the Chinese government manufactured fraudulent American driver’s licenses and secretly shipped them into the United States before the 2020 election.

According to the source cited in the report, the licenses could have enabled Chinese students and immigrants sympathetic to the CCP to cast ballots for Joe Biden despite being ineligible to vote. 

The report further alleged that information collected from millions of TikTok users could be used to place authentic names, addresses, and identification numbers on the fraudulent licenses, making them more difficult to detect.

The intelligence suggested that the documents were intended to facilitate tens of thousands of fraudulent mail-in ballots. However, the files do not establish that the purported plan was successfully carried out or altered any certified vote totals.

Just as disturbing is the intelligence community’s response. Internal FBI communications released by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley in July 2025 showed that FBI headquarters suppressed distribution of the report, reportedly because officials feared political criticism of then-Director Christopher Wray.

What is no longer disputable is that serious intelligence concerning possible CCP election interference existed—and Americans deserve to know why it was buried.

The Patriot Perspective has recently switched its main platform from YouTube, and we would greatly appreciate it if you subscribed to us there. [HERE]

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The COMMUNIST REVOLUTION Inside the Democrat Party Is Just Beginning (VIDEO)

The post BOMBSHELL FILES: CCP Used TikTok Data in 2020 Election Scheme as US Intelligence Officials Buried the Report appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.