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October 7th, 2025
Let’s dive in.
INTERVIEW: Five For Fighting’s John Ondrasik takes on the “battle for the soul of civilization”
Heard on the Hill
EXCLUSIVE: Trump Cabinet commemorates “Hell” of October 7th at the Kennedy Center alongside former hostages
EXCLUSIVE: Rep. Jim Jordan wants answers from liberal philanthropists about whether they “provided U.S. government funding to...terrorist-linked groups”
EXCLUSIVE: NRSC plans to hold anti-Israel Democrats accountable across America
EXCLUSIVE: Sen. Tom Cotton’s advice to Sen. John Kennedy before his Gridiron speech proved prophetic
EXCLUSIVE: New Senate ad compares Trump to “Triple Crown Winner”
EXCLUSIVE: Why Shari Redstone is helping the Kennedy Center commemorate October 7th terrorist attacks
EXCLUSIVE: Democrats commemorate October 7th by citing Hamas’s “falsified death toll numbers” and with silence
EXCLUSIVE: Top Senate Republican: “Hamas cannot remain in power”
EXCLUSIVE: Rep. Mike Simpson on October 7th anniversary: “America stands with our ally Israel”
SCOOP: RSC slams Chuck Schumer’s “hostage crisis” as Schumer Shutdown enters second week
SCOOP: Record-breaking congressional candidate rolls out campaign team filled with Trump veterans
SCOOP: First time candidate raises historic sums in bid to oust Ossoff
SCOOP: RSC Chair: Israel needs to “end Hamas’s reign of terror”
EXCLUSIVE: Rep. Pat Harrigan fought Islamic terrorism overseas. He explains why recent terrorist attacks show that America can’t choose “appeasement over strength”
OPINIONATED: Rep. Darrell Issa on why he backs Israel, Matthew Foldi on the threats remaining to Jews in America and around the world, Hannah Garceson why standing with Israel is the moral choice for Christians around the world, Dominique Hoffman on why Israel must defeat terrorism and why the American Right needs to win its battle from within, Isaac Woodward on the Christian case for Israel, and S.C. Legoni on the inversion of truth in the Middle East
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INTERVIEW: Five For Fighting’s John Ondrasik takes on the “battle for the soul of civilization”
by Matthew Foldi
When the music industry zigs, John Ondrasik — the front man and visionary behind Five For Fighting — zags.
Almost immediately after the brutal invasion of Israel by Palestinian terrorists on October 7th, 2023, protests began across the world — against Israel. Ondrasik’s industry was not only not immune, but in many cases it has fomented the hatred against the world’s only Jewish state.
In the two years since, musicians have done everything from expressly wishing death upon the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) to removing their songs from all of Israel. Ondrasik wants none of that, and said that the global turn against Israel inspired him to fight even harder in “the battle for the soul of civilization.”
“When I saw our college campuses, global leaders, media, and members of Congress embrace the propaganda of Hamas and label Israel the post-October 7th villain, I felt an obligation to stand up for truth and common sense in what has become an existential battle for civilization,” he told the Washington Reporter in an interview.
Heard on the Hill
MARIACHI DEMS: Senate Republicans watched a video at the Republican Senators’ lunch this week with clips of Sen. Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D., N.Y.) set to mariachi music. A source in the room told us that “Senators loved it. Schumer deserves to be mocked for the Schumer Shutdown.”
PAXTON VS. CHINA: Texas’s Attorney General Ken Paxton is getting praise from our Congressional sources for his investigation of a router tech [ [link removed] ] company’s ties to China. “If Big Tech is giving Chinese communists access to Americans’ data, there is no question that they’re using that data against us,” Attorney General Paxton said. “I will not allow any company to sell us out to our greatest geopolitical enemy. If TP Link is violating Texas law and jeopardizing Americans, my office will do everything in our power to hold them accountable.”
BIOTECH WIN FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP: Of all the manufacturing expansion announcements since President Donald Trump’s second term began, perhaps none has been bigger than the biotech industry. PhRMA, the trade association representing the biotech industry, celebrated [ [link removed] ] October as manufacturing month with an announcement of more than $500 billion in investments.
NOT SO FAST: Amy McGrath was decisively beaten by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) in 2020. Now, she is gearing up for a rematch, but she can’t even get her own party on board. “Please don’t,” former Rep. Susan Wild (D., Pa.) responded to McGrath.
ACCOUNTABILITY TIME: Jay Jones, the Democrats’ controversial nominee for Attorney General of Virginia, is causing major down-ballot headaches. The Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC) got in on the fun, targeting virtually every Virginia Democrat who has remained silent on Jones’s violence and speed-fueled scandals.
HUGE QUARTER: State Representative Houston Gaines raised an eye-popping $1.3 million in just two months for his campaign to succeed Rep. Mike Collins (R., Ga.), who is running for Senate.
A message from our sponsor.
We must protect American leadership in the life sciences and avoid damaging drug pricing policies. Meanwhile, China is making significant strides in clinical trials, drug approvals and new breakthroughs. Now is the time to strengthen American innovation, not hinder it. Learn more. [ [link removed] ]
EXCLUSIVE: Trump Cabinet commemorates “Hell” of October 7th at the Kennedy Center alongside former hostages
by Matthew Foldi
Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick has been to Hell — multiple times. Enough times, in fact, that he can recognize its scent. He first encountered its smell after losing both his parents in under two years. Decades later, Islamic terrorists struck the Twin Towers on September 11th, 2001 — instantly killing hundreds of Lutnick’s friends and colleagues, including his brother and over 600 people from his firm, Cantor Fitzgerald.
“When you lose one parent, it’s one thing,” Lutnick said at the Kennedy Center’s event commemorating the horrors that Palestinians visited on Israel when they invaded on October 7th, 2023 — raping, murdering, and kidnapping Jews and non-Jews alike, often on videos and selfies they took of themselves.
“When you lose the second parent, it’s quite another,” Lutnick said at a gathering that featured the majority of President Donald Trump’s cabinet; the Washington Reporter was the only news outlet present. “That was the first time that I visited Hell.”
EXCLUSIVE: Rep. Jim Jordan wants answers from liberal philanthropists about whether they “provided U.S. government funding to...terrorist-linked groups”
by Matthew Foldi
Shortly before President Donald Trump met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Rep. Jim Jordan (R., Ohio) sent a flurry of letters to organizations aligned with the Rockefeller brothers demanding answers on how American taxpayer dollars might have been funneled to overturn Netanyahu’s government and fund terrorist organizations in the Middle East.
In a series of letters to Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors (RPA) and to the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF), Jordan wrote that he wants answers about “how and to what extent U.S. taxpayer money has been funneled to certain Israeli entities with the effect of attempting to undermine Israel’s democratically elected government.”
In March 2025, Jordan’s Judiciary Committee wrote to RPA asking for documents, only to receive a partial list the following month. This slow response is insufficient to Jordan, who wrote that “RPA has not raised any legitimate justification or privilege that would excuse it from complying with the Committee’s requests.”
“We write to reiterate our request for your voluntary cooperation with our oversight and to request additional information about RPA funding that ends up with groups with ties to terrorist organizations.”
EXCLUSIVE: NRSC plans to hold anti-Israel Democrats accountable across America
by Matthew Foldi
On the two year anniversary of the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, Senate Republicans are eager to note that Democratic Senate candidates across the country have “spent more time attacking Israel than they have condemning Hamas’ barbaric October 7th attack two years ago.”
Joanna Rodriguez, the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s (NRSC) Communications Director, painted a bleak picture of the Senate map for Democrats when it comes to standing with America’s closest ally in the Middle East.
“The new litmus test for progressive credentials is whether Democrats will accuse Israel of genocide or tie themselves to known anti-Semitic activists,” Rodriguez told the Washington Reporter. “As Democrats continue to pander to their pro-Hamas, radical base, the NRSC is committed to doing everything in our power to make sure these candidates never set foot in the U.S. Senate.”
EXCLUSIVE: Sen. Tom Cotton’s advice to Sen. John Kennedy before his Gridiron speech proved prophetic
by Matthew Foldi
Sen. John Kennedy (R., La.) is always ready with a quick soundbite, but the 2019 Gridiron Dinner was a different animal for even the talkative Louisianan.
So, he reached out to Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) for advice, as Kennedy recounts in his new book, How to Test Negative for Stupid: And Why Washington Never Will.
In a section obtained exclusively by the Washington Reporter, Kennedy details reaching out to Cotton — a former Gridiron speaker in his own right — to ask for help.
“In the lead-up to the event, I called Senator Tom Cotton, who had done the Gridiron Dinner before,” Kennedy chronicles in his book. “I asked him how he’d come up with his jokes. He told me that many senators who weren’t naturally funny (most of them) hired a comedy writer to assist.”
So, Kennedy “had one of my staff members check around and learned that the going rate to hire a joke writer in Washington was around ten thousand dollars,” he wrote. But, in a move unsurprising to anyone who has seen Kennedy on television, he instead said “screw that. I decided to write my own jokes, and I asked my staff for their contributions as well. I finally came up with what I thought was a pretty good speech. Just before the day of the dinner, Cotton warned me that although the media crowd at the dinner would definitely laugh at the jokes I’d written about my fellow Republicans, they were much less likely to laugh at the jokes about Democrats or the media.
EXCLUSIVE: New Senate ad compares Trump to “Triple Crown Winner”
by Matthew Foldi
Rep. Andy Barr (R., Ky.) rolled out a new ad, obtained exclusively by the Washington Reporter, in his Senate race that compares President Donald Trump to one of Kentucky’s most legendary icons: a triple crown winner.
Barr told the Washington Reporter that he is “proud to have endorsed President Trump when no one else would. I was the first in the Kentucky delegation to back him, and was honored to be Chairman of his 2024 Presidential Campaign in Kentucky.”
“Now,” the Trump-aligned congressman added, “I’m running for Senate to be his number one ally to finish the fight and Make America Great Again.”
In his latest ad, Barr explains why Trump is akin to the best horse racers in the world.
“As an eighth-generation Kentuckian, I know a good horse when I see one,” Barr says. “And President Trump is a Triple Crown winner.”
EXCLUSIVE: Why Shari Redstone is helping the Kennedy Center commemorate October 7th terrorist attacks
by Matthew Foldi
Ahead of the second year anniversary of the October 7th, 2023 terrorist attacks, there are very few events commemorating the horrors anywhere in Washington, D.C.
But the Kennedy Center, Shari Redstone, and the Redstone Family Foundation were dead set on changing that. They are teaming up to announce multiple days of programming at the premiere arts center in Washington, D.C. that will, Redstone told the Washington Reporter, “deepen understanding of the terror inflicted that day, the agony of the hostages, and the enduring pain of their families.”
“Our Foundation is glad to have the opportunity to work with the Kennedy Center on this vital remembrance of the events of October 7th,” the legendary media executive told the Reporter. “Only by sharing this information can people truly comprehend the reality behind the headlines.”
EXCLUSIVE: Democrats commemorate October 7th by citing Hamas’s “falsified death toll numbers” and with silence
by Matthew Foldi
Congressional and national Democrats commemorated the two year anniversary of the terrorist attacks of October 7th, 2023 with a mixture of citing Hamas terrorists and with outright silence.
Aging Democrats like Sen. Ed Markey (D., Mass.) cited death counts from Hamas in their statements about the terrorist attack.
“Since that terrible day, more than 65,000 Palestinians have lost their lives in the brutality of the war in Gaza,” Markey wrote. Jewish Insider’s Emily Jacobs noted that Markey’s statement “quotes the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry’s falsified death toll numbers.”
But Markey was not alone, and the Democrats’ reliance on bogus numbers from a Palestinian terrorist organization spanned generations. Democrat Zohran Mamdani also mourned the “death toll that now far exceeds 67,000.”
EXCLUSIVE: Top Senate Republican: “Hamas cannot remain in power”
by Matthew Foldi
As Hamas terrorists play a sadistic game of Lucy and the football with President Donald Trump, one of his top allies in the Senate is making it clear that “Hamas cannot remain in power.”
Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.), the Chair of the Senate Republican Conference, told the Washington Reporter on the two-year anniversary of the October 7th terrorist attacks that he joins with “Arkansans in commemorating the more than 1,000 Israelis and Americans who were attacked, brutalized, kidnapped, and murdered two years ago today by Hamas.”
“These attacks,” Cotton, the Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, continued, were “the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, [and they] show why Hamas cannot remain in power. The United States has a simple strategic and moral imperative, which is also the best way to rescue the hostages and honor the memory of the lost: back Israel to the hilt.”
EXCLUSIVE: Rep. Mike Simpson on October 7th anniversary: “America stands with our ally Israel”
by Matthew Foldi
On the two year anniversary of the terrorist attacks of October 7th, 2023, Rep. Mike Simpson (R., Idaho) told the Washington Reporter that his position on the events is unequivocal.
“America stands with our ally, Israel, and we will never forget,” the veteran congressman told the Reporter.
The lawmaker also made it clear where he believes the blame squarely lies. “It’s been two years since Hamas launched a horrific terror attack on Israel,” Simpson added. “These terrorists beheaded babies, raped women, and kidnapped the elderly.”
For years — and especially in the immediate aftermath of October 7th itself — Simpson has voted to support America’s strongest ally in the Middle East.
SCOOP: RSC slams Chuck Schumer’s “hostage crisis” as Schumer Shutdown enters second week
by Matthew Foldi
“As a fighter pilot, I care deeply about national security, and the negative impacts Chuck Schumer’s shutdown has had on our national security,” the Chairman of the Republican Study Committee (RSC) said as the Schumer Shutdown enters its second week.
Rep. August Pfluger, a decorated Air Force pilot and former squadron commander pointed to the 1.3 million active-duty military service members, along with hundreds of thousands of active members of the National Guard, and Americans who work for the Defense Department who will miss a paycheck on October 15th if Senate Democrats continue their refusal to reopen the government.
“It’s disgraceful to think about military members and border patrol agents who will be forced to work without pay,” Pfluger said on an RSC conference call. He also questioned “why do military-dependent kids have to suffer through that?”
SCOOP: Record-breaking congressional candidate rolls out campaign team filled with Trump veterans
by Matthew Foldi
A leading Republican congressional candidate ended the most recent fundraising quarter with a historic fundraising haul — and he told the Washington Reporter that he’s adding a suite of Trump-aligned advisors to keep Iowa’s 2nd District in GOP control.
Joe Mitchell, an alum of the Trump administration and the founder of Run Gen Z — an organization dedicated to helping young Republicans like him run for office — raised a historic $400,000 in his first quarter as a congressional candidate, which is the most ever for a non-incumbent congressional candidate in Iowa history.
Now, Mitchell has his senior campaign team in place — and he’s bringing in heavy hitters who have long track records of winning in both Iowa and across the country for Republicans like President Donald Trump.
SCOOP: First time candidate raises historic sums in bid to oust Ossoff
by Matthew Foldi
Derek Dooley has never run for office before running to challenge Sen. Jon Ossoff (D., Ga.) in one of 2026’s marquee Senate races. But in just two months, he has raised just shy of $2 million, according to his most recent campaign finance filings.
Dooley’s $1.85 million haul is more than several other Republicans who went on to win Senate races in the Peach State — like David Perdue — raised in their first quarters of their race, and he did it in under 60 days. All of Dooley’s haul was raised from donors, making it even more impressive to have done in so little time.
Critically for Republicans’ bid to unseat the well-funded Ossoff is that almost all of Dooley’s money is still in the bank; he has over $1.7 million cash on hand.
SCOOP: RSC Chair: Israel needs to “end Hamas’s reign of terror”
by Matthew Foldi
On the two year anniversary of the barbaric terrorist attacks on Israel by Palestinian terrorists, the Chairman of the Republican Study Committee (RSC) made it clear that Israel needs to “end Hamas’s reign of terror.”
Rep. August Pfluger (R., Texas), a decorated Air Force veteran, told the Washington Reporter that it’s clear where the blame for the war lies.
“Two years ago today, Hamas launched a barbaric and unprovoked assault on Israel, slaughtering innocent men, women, and children, then parading their victims’ bodies through the streets in celebration,” Pfluger said. “This evil cannot stand, and anti-Semitism must be outright condemned and confronted.”
EXCLUSIVE: Rep. Pat Harrigan fought Islamic terrorism overseas. He explains why recent terrorist attacks show that America can’t choose “appeasement over strength”
by Matthew Foldi
A decorated combat veteran-turned congressman is cautioning Americans about the dangers of Islamic terrorism, following an Islamic terrorist attack in Manchester where a foreign jihadist stabbed Jews to death on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.
Rep. Pat Harrigan (R., N.C.), a former Green Beret, told the Washington Reporter that the result of weak immigration policies in Europe is “blood in the streets and families left defenseless.”
“The Manchester synagogue attack was carried out by a Syrian migrant who became a British citizen, murdered innocent people, and strapped on a fake suicide vest to slow down police,” Harrigan explained. “His very name, Jihad, captures what happens when Europe abandons security, throws open its borders, and refuses to confront radical Islam.”
OPINIONATED
Op-Ed: Rep. Darrell Issa: Why Israel will always have my support
by Rep. Darrell Issa
On October 7th, 2023, I was preparing to board a flight from Saudi Arabia to Israel along with several of my Congressional colleagues. Then came the first reports and the continuing confirmations of the brutal and deadly attacks by Hamas that killed more than a thousand Israelis and saw hundreds more dragged into Gaza to be held as hostages.
Our hearts sank with the realization that this was Israel’s 9/11. Our flight was immediately redirected back to the United States.
Only days later, I returned to Israel and visited a kibbutz where terrorists carried out an unprovoked slaughter of civilians. There were blood stains and bullet holes on the walls. Homes were burned to the ground. We saw the ransacked possessions of the residents and the scattered toys of children. Again and again, we were shown residences and told: “No survivors.”
Op-Ed: Matthew Foldi: Threats to Jews remain clear and present two years after October 7th
by Matthew Foldi
On October 7th, 2023, the world witnessed unspeakable horrors, proudly filmed by barbarians from Gaza: mass slaughter, rape, abduction of civilians, and the desecration of both Jewish and non-Jewish lives in Israel.
But as the world’s attention slowly drifts, two years later we must not pretend the threat to Jews — here in America, and around the globe — has receded. If anything, it looms closer, darker, and more insidious than ever.
In recent months, the violence has edged into the capitals and neighborhoods that many believed were safe. In Washington, D.C., two staffers of the Israeli Embassy — Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim — were gunned down outside the Capital Jewish Museum. The shooter, Elias Rodriguez, was arrested and later charged with hate crime and murder counts.
Op-Ed: Hannah Garces: Why standing with Israel is the moral choice for Christians around the world
by Hannah Garces
It’s one of those moments in life that you remember exactly where you were when you got the news. The light was coming through the windows of my bedroom that October morning. My husband and I stared at our phones that were ringing with message alerts. The first images coming through our screen of the situation in Israel. We didn’t know then what types of horrors were in store. The worst part of it all was that the world showed us the that their hatred for Israel and for the Jewish people wasn’t a past bogeyman but alive — well and growing with a momentum that seemed unfathomable in the wake of the massacre.
To think that we would never go back to the world of October 6th, 2023, still lingers but how can we? As a Christian, I looked to faith leaders to say something and be light in those moments. Far too few used their pulpits or platforms to say anything. It hurt. It shocked me. Did we, the Church, learn nothing from the German church in the 1930s? Was the church choosing to select what issues it would shepherd its congregants through? Were their politics leading their theology?
Op-Ed: Dominique Hoffman: We must win both Israel’s war for survival and America’s battle from within
by Dominique Hoffman
The tragedy that united Israel fractured the American Right, revealing the ideological and spiritual war consuming the West from within.
October 7th, 2023 is a day akin to the tragedy of September 11th, 2001 for Americans, and it will forever change Israeli politics, the way war is fought in the Middle East, and the war calculus of the IDF.
A profound shift also occurred in American politics that day. Whereas the tragedy unified a bitterly divided Israeli political consensus, the question of Israel has bitterly divided the American Right.
Op-Ed: Isaac Woodward: Why Christians stand with Israel two years after October 7th
by Isaac Woodward
Exactly two years ago, the United States was invaded by tens of thousands of members of a Mexican drug cartel who murdered over 44,000 Americans and kidnapped over ten thousand more. They used GoPro cameras to livestream their rape, murder, torture, and dismemberment of men, women and children. Notably, they largely avoided Border Patrol stations, military bases, and law enforcement installations. Their stated aim and tactics were simple: to inflict the maximum amount of terrorism against civilian targets and brag about their terror to the world.
After being beaten back, these cartels fired hundreds of thousands of rockets from Mexico into the southwestern United States for over 700 days. To date, thousands of Americans still languish in cartel captivity, hoping and praying that their country rescues them.
Op-Ed: S.C. Legoni: The anti-Israel narrative is the opposite of the truth
by S.C. Legoni
The anti-Israel narrative is more than just dishonest. It inverts reality altogether.
Recently, pictures of children with birth defects were passed off on social media and in major news outlets as “evidence” that Israel was starving Gazans. In truth, it is Israeli hostages who are being starved [ [link removed] ]. Hamas itself released videos [ [link removed] ] showing emaciated Israelis tortured in Hamas dungeons. The real victims of starvation and abuse are used as props by their tormentors, and the world blames the victims.
But this reversal of fact is not limited to one instance. It is the core mechanism of the entire anti-Israel narrative.

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