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Back in the Fight

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Back in the Fight

UTO, Sweden — The final time this famously impartial nation went to battle, Napoleon was on the again foot in France and Britain was making ready to burn Washington.

However Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has upended 200 years of world pacifism for the kids of the Vikings.

And so it was that as President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia issued veiled threats late final month about unleashing nuclear battle, the US was holding army workout routines with Sweden, considered one of NATO’s most up-to-date candidates.

Whereas the battle raged in Ukraine, a whole lot of Marines joined their Swedish counterparts for maneuvers within the Baltic Sea, on and round a few of Sweden’s 100,000 principally uninhabited islands. Within the chilly rain and beneath heavy hearth, they scrambled up slippery rocks, landed fight boats on shores and crawled on their bellies by way of forested ravines.

On the island of Uto, which Russia invaded in 1719, American and Swedish marines spent two weeks launching spherical after spherical of artillery as a part of their coaching to verify the previous doesn’t repeat itself. (The Russians burned the place to cinders, leaving solely a church steeple in a single village.)

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For the People, that is considerably new territory. After 20 years of battle in Iraq and Afghanistan, the maneuvers required for fight within the Baltic Sea symbolize a crash course in amphibious warfare, together with diving into frigid waters whereas clad in heavy gear and carrying machine weapons. It means studying easy methods to stay underwater for lengthy intervals of time earlier than rising in a burst of attacking machine gunfire.

“It’s positively a special kind of setting than Afghanistan or Iraq, the place we’re very vehicular-mobile,” stated Brig. Gen. Andrew T. Priddy, the commander of the Second Marine Expeditionary Brigade.

From a moist and windy hilltop on the island of Lilla Skogsskar, Common Priddy stored watch as U.S. and Swedish marines stormed the seashores of close by Stora Skogsskar.

“Having the ability to function in this sort of setting within the archipelago is extraordinarily vital, and we as a Marine Corps have so much to study from them,” he stated of the Swedes.

That is considerably new territory for Sweden as nicely. The terrain could also be acquainted, however battle will not be — not for this technology, or their dad and mom’ technology, or their grandparents’ or great-grandparents’ generations. The nation’s final battle was in 1814, when it pried Norway free from the Danes. For 200 years, Sweden maintained a nonaligned overseas coverage throughout occasions of peace and proclaimed itself impartial throughout occasions of battle.

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Sweden averted World Warfare II, sparing itself the German occupation that Norway endured and the Soviet invasion suffered by the Finns. Throughout the Chilly Warfare, Sweden continued its impartial path. The nation despatched troops to United Nations peacekeeping operations world wide, and even to Afghanistan after Sept. 11 assaults in the US, however declined to affix NATO.

After which Feb. 24, 2022, occurred. The Russian invasion of Ukraine introduced into sharp aid the restrictions of being in Europe however not having the safety ensures of NATO’s collective protection pact. The Finns — dragging the Swedes with them — utilized for membership within the alliance.

“Navy nonalignment has served Sweden nicely, however our conclusion is that it gained’t serve us equally nicely sooner or later,” Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson of Sweden stated on the time. “This isn’t a call to be taken calmly.”

Inside weeks of the bulletins that the 2 nations wished to affix NATO, alliance army planners had been scheduling reveals of pressure with them, together with a number of workout routines.

Actually, because the Marines, most of them from the Second Marine Expeditionary Drive, had been within the Swedish archipelago, one other group of Marines was working towards island seizures with the Finnish Navy.

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“We’re sending a message to principally Russia, that now we have companions, we’re coaching, we’re increase our capability and the potential,” stated Col. Adam Camel, commander of the Swedish Navy’s First Marine Regiment. “We’re united, I might say, and really desperate to defend Sweden, in addition to this area.”

The give attention to taking and defending islands is essential, army officers say, as a result of the Baltic Sea will quickly be encircled, save for Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg, by NATO nations: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Germany, Denmark — plus Finland and Sweden. If the allies approve their memberships, each nations can be anticipated to contribute to any chokeholds that NATO would possibly put in place within the sea within the occasion of a battle with Russia, officers on the Pentagon say.

The Swedish archipelago can be a part of any such endeavor.

Throughout the workout routines, American Marines experimented with a slew of latest methods to conduct warfare, gained from previous conflicts in numerous climes.

In a single case, a really completely different clime.

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Perched atop Lilla Skogsskar, Sgt. David Swinton, a radio operator with the Second Marine Division, checked the controls of a radar that he and his platoon mates known as “the system.”

“The system,” basically a Simrad Halo 24 radar that may be placed on any fishing boat, is available on the business market — you may get one at Bass Professional Outlets for about $3,000. However for the previous 12 months, Sergeant Swinton and his fellow radio operators have been engaged on adapting the radar to be used in battle maneuvers world wide.

“We found out easy methods to take this and tie it into the SIPR community,” Sergeant Swinton defined, in a reference to the pc networks utilized by the Pentagon to transmit categorized data. “So we are able to tie it in there, and anybody on the earth can get on they usually can see what we’re sending out with this radar.”

It takes 5 minutes to arrange. A marine stationed on any of the islands would have the ability to use the radar to ship again information on Russian ships.

“We’re bringing stuff like this to Sweden to point out them that you may put four-man groups on an island 60 miles from one other one, and we are able to scan your entire island for you and feed that data again to your naval fleets,” Sergeant Swinton stated. “You’ll be able to have full consciousness of what’s occurring in your shoreline.”

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The thought got here, incongruously, from the Houthis in Yemen, the scrappy, Iranian-backed rebels who’ve bedeviled an American-backed coalition of Gulf States for years and rule a swath of territory in northern Yemen. The Houthis, who wield an enormous arsenal of cruise and ballistic missiles, kamikaze boats and long-range drones, have used the radars to trace Emirati and Saudi ships.

Then the commanding normal of the Second Marine Division, Maj. Gen. Francis L. Donovan noticed what the Houthis had been doing again when he was main a Fifth Fleet amphibious activity pressure working within the southern Purple Sea.

“We had been attempting to determine how they had been concentrating on coalition transport,” Common Donovan stated in an interview. Quickly he realized that the Houthis had been utilizing off-the-shelf radars, mounting them on autos on the shore and transferring them round.

Common Donovan thought the maneuvers had been excellent for cellular, on-the-move Marines. He challenged his Second Mild Armored Reconnaissance Battalion to develop the same system.

One 12 months later, Sergeant Swinton and Employees Sgt. Joseph Owen, a platoon commander with a tour in Afghanistan beneath his belt, had been checking to see if the Houthi-inspired radar system would work towards Russian ships within the Baltics.

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For Sweden, any system that may detect goings-on within the archipelago is price incorporating into its arsenal, stated Rear Adm. Ewa Skoog Haslum, the Swedish Navy chief. The shallow waters that encompass the islands make it simple for Russian submarines to cover, she stated.

“It’s very arduous to have the anti-submarine warfare searching within the archipelago,” Admiral Haslum stated in an interview in Stockholm. “You want particular capabilities.”

Nobody is saying the Simrad boat radar can detect Russian submarines within the archipelago. However that, Common Donovan stated, is the great thing about working in an alliance.

“There’s not one factor that does all, however we’ll present one medium, and another person will care for different mediums,” he stated.

Russia doesn’t have any companions proper now, he famous. “Our energy is our allies and companions, and the way we deliver that each one collectively.”

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Trump predicts 'jacked up' Biden at upcoming debates, blasts Bidenomics in battleground speech

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Trump predicts 'jacked up' Biden at upcoming debates, blasts Bidenomics in battleground speech

It’s been more than 50 years since a Republican won Minnesota in a presidential election, but former President Trump says he’s got “a really good shot” of breaking the losing streak this November in his 2024 rematch with President Biden.

The former president is in the historically reliable blue state Friday evening to headline the Minnesota GOP’s annual Lincoln Reagan fundraising dinner. He began his speech with the usual jabs at Biden’s cognitive ability, but also referenced the recently agreed to debates between the two.

“He’s going to be so jacked up for those, you watch,” Trump joked, later saying he was going to “demand a drug test” for Biden before the debate.

BIDEN CAMPAIGN HIGH ON DOJ’S MARIJUANA SHIFT, ‘SMOKES’ TRUMP FOR INACTION DURING HIS TERM

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump attends the annual Lincoln Reagan Dinner hosted by the Minnesota Republican party on May 17, 2024 in St. Paul, Minnesota.  (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

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He went on to promise a rollback of Biden’s environmental mandates relating to automakers, railed against the sour economic statistics under Biden, and vowed to fix the ongoing border crisis.

Trump also blasted Biden’s habit of repeating false stories concerning his life experiences. “He’s so full of s–t,” Trump said as the crowd laughed.

Trump lost Minnesota by just 1½ points in his 2016 presidential election victory over Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. Four years ago, he lost the state to President Biden by more than seven points in his unsuccessful re-election campaign.

Ahead of the 2020 election, Trump promised a victory in Minnesota, saying that if he lost, “I’m never coming back.”

FIRST ON FOX: TOP JEWISH GOP GROUP STEPS UP FUNDRAISING FOR TRUMP AMID ANTI-ISRAEL COLLEGE CAMPUS PROTESTS 

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Trump Minnesota

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at the annual Lincoln Reagan Dinner hosted by the Minnesota Republican party on May 17, 2024 in St. Paul, Minnesota.  (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Fast-forward four years and Trump is back and once again predicting a victory.

“We think we have a really good shot at Minnesota,” Trump emphasized in an interview Wednesday with KSTP, a local TV station in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul. “We have great friendships up there.”

Trump added that he’s “worked hard on Minnesota” and that “Tom Emmer is very much involved,” pointing to the House majority whip.

Emmer, who is joining Trump at the state GOP gala, is chairing the Trump campaign in Minnesota even though the former president and his allies helped sink Emmer’s bid last autumn to become House speaker.

As the Trump and Biden campaigns prepare for battle in seven crucial swing states that decided the 2020 election (Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, which were narrowly won by Biden, and North Carolina, which Trump carried by a razor-thin margin) and will likely once again in the 2024 rematch, both campaigns see opportunities to expand the map.

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WARNING SIGNS FOR TRUMP, BIDEN, AS THEY CAREEN TOWARD DEBATES 

Two weekends ago at a closed-door Republican National Committee retreat for top-dollar donors  at a resort in Palm Beach, Florida, senior Trump campaign advisers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita and veteran pollster Tony Fabrizio spotlighted internal surveys that suggested both “Minnesota and Virginia are clearly in play.”

“In both states, Trump finds himself in positions to flip key electoral votes in his favor,” the survey, which was shared with Fox News, emphasizes. 

Trump Minnesota

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump attends the annual Lincoln Reagan Dinner hosted by the Minnesota Republican party on May 17, 2024 in St. Paul, Minnesota. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

And both states have sizable populations of rural white voters without college degrees who disproportionately support the former president.

Biden’s campaign disagrees that either Minnesota or Virginia are up for grabs.

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While noting they are “not taking any state or any vote for granted,” Biden campaign battleground states director Dan Kanninen told reporters last week “we don’t see polls that are six or seven months out from a general election, head-to-head numbers certainly, as any more predictive than a weather report is six or seven months out.”

Kanninen highlighted that the campaign has teams on the ground in both states engaging voters.

“We feel strongly the Biden-Harris coalition in both Minnesota and Virginia, which has been strong in the midterms and off-year elections, will continue to be strong for us in the fall of 2024,” he added.

And Biden campaign spokesperson Lauren Hitt, pointing to the president’s current fundraising dominance and ground-game advantage in the key battlegrounds, argued “Trump’s team has so little campaign or infrastructure to speak of they’re resorting to leaking memos that say ‘the polls we paid for show us winning.’” 

But Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota, who launched a long-shot and unsuccessful primary challenge against the president, insists “Minnesota’s in play.”

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Phillips, in an interview this week on Fox News’ “Special Edition,” argued Minnesota’s “like a lot of states that I think a lot of my fellow Democrats don’t want to confess is the reality. … I’m telling my Democratic colleagues who are supporting President Biden, myself included, that there’s a lot of work to do.”

While Trump’s campaign looks for opportunities to expand the map in Minnesota and Virginia, Biden’s campaign appears to be eyeing swing state North Carolina and Florida. 

Trump carried the Sunshine State by less than four points in 2020, but two years ago, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis and GOP Sen. Marco Rubio each won re-election by nearly 20 points.

LaCivita argued the Biden campaign was playing “a faux game” in both states but insisted Trump has a “real opportunity in expanding the map in Virginia and Minnesota.”

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Trump’s stop in Minnesota comes a week after he held a large rally in Wildwood, New Jersey, a red bastion in an overwhelming blue state where no Republican has carried the state in a presidential election in over three decades. Trump lost the state to Biden by 16 points four years ago.

“We’re going to win New Jersey,” Trump vowed at the rally.

Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more at our Fox News Digital election hub.

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Federal judge orders ICE to end 'knock and talk' arrests of immigrants in Southern California

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Federal judge orders ICE to end 'knock and talk' arrests of immigrants in Southern California

A federal judge in Los Angeles has ruled that a tactic used by federal immigration agents in Southern California to arrest people in their homes without a judicial warrant is unconstitutional and must end.

The judgment — issued Wednesday against the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency — involves so-called knock and talk practices.

ICE didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

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Advocates argued that the immigration agency rarely obtains judicial warrants and instead counts on immigrants answering their doors voluntarily. Advocates alleged agents routinely misrepresent themselves as police to gain entry so they can carry out an arrest.

Immigrant advocacy groups praised the ruling.

“It is a basic human right for immigrants to feel safe in their own homes and live without fear,” Lizbeth Abeln, interim director at the Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice, wrote in a news release Thursday. “This won’t undo the years of harm done by ICE, but it is a good first step towards justice.”

The order applies only to ICE’s Los Angeles field office, which includes the counties of Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino, Riverside, Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo. An expert witness said that available data showed ICE’s knock and talk methods accounted for at least 8% of arrests in 2022.

Four examples listed in the order — occurring between 2017 and 2020 — illustrate instances in which immigration agents entered constitutionally protected areas around a person’s home, such as their porch, patio or backyard, to make contact for an arrest.

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Advocates said the practice has continued since then in Los Angeles and across the country.

U.S. District Judge Otis D. Wright II rejected ICE’s argument that its agents could enter the private areas surrounding a home to knock on the door because mail carriers and delivery people routinely do so.

Immigration agents walk up to a resident’s home without consent and, when the person opens the door, the agents “generally state that they are ‘conducting an investigation,’” according to the order. ICE policies and training encourage agents to use knock and talks, calling the practice one of the four primary methods of apprehension.

“Despite often stating a different purpose for their visit, the true ‘intent’ and ‘actual purpose’ behind a ‘knock and talk’ is to make an immigration arrest,” the judge wrote.

The agents would be permitted to enter those areas if their goal was merely to ask questions, Wright wrote. But he said the Constitution prohibits them from doing so “without a judicial warrant with the intent to arrest the occupant.”

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“The more accurate title,” Wright wrote, “would be ‘knock and arrests.’”

The ruling stems from a 2020 class-action lawsuit filed on behalf of two local advocacy organizations, the Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice and the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, as well as one individual, Osny Sorto-Vasquez Kidd.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, the UC Irvine School of Law Immigrant Rights Clinic, and the law firm Munger, Tolles & Olson represented the plaintiffs.

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Video: Insults Disrupt House Oversight Committee Session

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Video: Insults Disrupt House Oversight Committee Session

“Do you know what we’re here for? You know we’re here about AG.” “I don’t think you know what you’re here for.” “Well, you’re the one talking about —” “I think your fake eyelashes are messing up —” “Ain’t nothing —” “Hold on, hold on.” [gavel pounding] “Order.” “Mr. Chairman.” “That’s beneath even you —” “Order, order. Regain order of your committee.” “I would like to move to take down Ms. Greene’s words. That is absolutely unacceptable. How dare you attack the physical appearance of another person.” “Are your feelings hurt?” “Move her words, down.” “Aww.” “Oh, oh girl, baby girl.” “Oh, really?” “Don’t even play.” “Baby girl. I don’t think —” “We are going to move and we’re going to take your words down.” “I second that motion.” “You agree to strike your words?” “Yeah.” “O.K. — Ms. Greene agrees to strike her words.” “I believe she should apologize. No, no, no.” “Hold on. Then, after Mr. Perry’s going to be recognized, then —” “I’m not apologizing.” “Well, then you’re not striking your words.” “You reserve the right to object.” “I am not apologizing.” “Just to better understand your ruling: If someone on this committee then starts talking about somebody’s bleached blonde, bad-built butch body, that would not be engaging in personalities, correct?” “A what now?” “Chariman, I make, I make a motion to strike those words.” “I don’t think that’s —” “I’m trying to find clarification on what —” “Chairman, motion to strike those words.” We’re not, we’re not going to do this. Look, you guys earlier, literally just —” “You just voted to do this.” “Y’all did it first.” “You just voted to do it.” “Order, order.” “I’m trying to get clarification.” “Look — calm down. Calm down.” “No, no, no, no because this is what you all do. So I’m trying to get —” “Ms. Crockett, you’re not recognized.”

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