Badlands Brief

A Politician is Swallowelled Whole as the Middle East Realigns in Real Time

The Badlands Brief is your daily drop of Badlands’ takes on the narratives dominating the info war. Read on, and join the conversation in the comments section.

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The Swalwell Scandal Goes Deep …

Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell (CA) resigned from Congress effective immediately one day after suspending his campaign for California governor.

The move came amid a surge of sexual misconduct allegations, including a fresh rape claim filed with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Swalwell has denied all accusations, and his office cited the mounting claims plus an ongoing House Ethics Committee investigation as the reason for stepping down.

The latest allegation was brought by Lonna Drewes, a former model and fashion technology entrepreneur. She claims that in July 2018, after meeting Swalwell three times that year while he offered political connections for her business, he drugged her with a spiked glass of wine in a West Hollywood hotel room at the Montrose Hotel. Drewes alleges he then raped and choked her unconscious; she said she believed she was going to die.

Corroborating details include her contemporaneous journal entries, preserved texts and photos, accounts she shared with friends at the time, and a formal complaint filed the day the story broke.

FEC campaign finance records show “Swalwell for Congress” spent $361 at that exact hotel on July 18, 2018, and the Sheriff’s Department confirmed the location of the alleged incident.

This brings the total public accusations against Swalwell to at least five (some reporting says six), including claims of rape by a former staffer while she was too intoxicated to consent. Additional scrutiny involves a hotel-room video—circulated on X and verified as authentic by forensic analysis held by Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL)—showing Swalwell kissing an alleged sex worker; Luna stated the person who recorded it was reportedly an underage female and that more damaging material would be released within 24 hours.

The Manhattan DA’s office is already investigating prior assault claims, and Luna publicly accused Hill insiders and reporters of having known about the stories for years without reporting them. Swalwell maintains the accusations are false.

Ashe in America: It was an open secret, they say.

This communication rollout on Eric Swalwell is comprehensive and well done. It appears planned and timed to reignite the outrage with a new victim statement or video clip or witness at the moment the last one begins to fizzle out.

That is, it’s being sustained.

April 10: San Francisco Chronicle published an initial report with a former staffer alleging of inappropriate sexual encounters and two instances of sexual assault (2019 and 2024 in New York). Hours later, CNN corroborated details from the same woman plus three other women alleging unsolicited explicit photos/texts, unwanted advances, and other misconduct. Swalwell denied all claims.

April 11: Campaign staffers begin resigning; prominent Democrats call for Swalwell to drop out of the California governor's race. Manhattan DA's office opens a criminal investigation into the 2024 New York assault allegation.

April 12: Swalwell suspends his campaign for California governor. He acknowledges "mistakes in judgment" in the past but strongly denies non-consensual acts.

April 13: House Ethics Committee opens a formal investigation into sexual misconduct, including toward a supervised employee. Swalwell announces he will resign from Congress. (Does the investigation continue?)

Then came Tuesday:

April 14: Fifth woman, former model Lonna Drewes holds a press conference alleging Swalwell drugged, raped, and choked her unconscious in a 2018 Beverly Hills hotel room. She says plans to file a police report.

WATCH:

Of course, the allegations remain unproven in court, and Swalwell is innocent of the rape and rape-adjacent crimes until proven guilty. Same goes for the treason. Also, what secrets did he sell?

Swalwell continues to deny wrongdoing.

One of the leading beliefs right now is that the Democrats didn’t need him anymore, so they’ve distanced themselves and now he’s outside the regime’s protection so they can all claim they didn’t know and act surprised.

But it was an open secret.

Tony Gonzales (TX-23) also resigned Tuesday.

And Senator Rueben Gallego (AZ) is facing calls to resign after failing to convince the press that he’s not the other guy in the gang bang video with Swalwell.

Happy hump day!

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Italy Suspends Defense Agreements With Israel Over Lebanon Tensions

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni announced that her government is suspending the automatic renewal of a long-standing defence cooperation memorandum of understanding with Israel.

The 2003 MoU, which entered into force in 2006 under Silvio Berlusconi and renewed every five years unless one side opted out, covers military procurement, training, the exchange of defence equipment and technology, and related activities such as arms transit.

The decision was made on April 13 following consultations with senior ministers, including Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani and Defence Minister Guido Crosetto. It comes amid Italy’s sharp criticism of Israel’s military operations in Lebanon, which have caused hundreds of deaths and thousands of injuries, and follows a specific incident last week in which Israeli forces fired warning shots at Italian troops serving with the U.N. peacekeeping mission (UNIFIL) in southern Lebanon, damaging a vehicle.

Italy responded by summoning Israel’s ambassador.

Meloni stated, “When there are things we don’t agree with, we act accordingly,” signaling the government’s position on the current Middle East situation.

Israel’s foreign ministry downplayed the suspension, describing the 2003 agreement as an old memorandum with “no substantive content” that has never significantly affected bilateral security cooperation and would have little practical impact.

Meloni’s right-wing government had been one of Israel’s closest European allies since taking office in 2022, making the move a notable shift that analysts link to domestic political positioning and broader tensions over the Lebanon conflict.

GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: Hope yall are ready for another one of my schizo takes.

In the course of researching for one of my shows, The Book of Trump (Mondays at 7:30 PM EST), I learned that Donald Trump has a long history of using agent provocateurs to instigate conflict.

The best, clearcut example of this was his use of Omarosa in his hit television program, The Celebrity Apprentice.

Omarosa rose to prominence during the first season of The Apprentice, before celebrities were introduced to the program. Though she didn't win the contest, Omarosa demonstrated the kind of strong personality and charisma that Trump is drawn toward. What I learned from watching random episodes of latter seasons (researching for the show) was that the contest wasn't about business acumen; it was about the ability to handle intense pressure and scrutiny in the public eye while still being able to perform and deliver.

As far as I can tell, it was a recruiting program disguised as a reality television game show.

In the first few seasons of the show, Trump brought in MBA candidates and successful business owners as his contestants, reinforcing the premise that the show was actually about business acumen.

Despite the show's tremendous success, Trump rebranded it as The Celebrity Apprentice, and season after season, he sought to assemble an island of misfit toys as his contestants.

The cast was very diverse; everything from washed up superstars to D-list celebrities to aspiring comedians, and everything in between.

To me, it appeared that Trump was strategically targeting people who had some level of public clout—which translated to a certain level of access in the celebrity world—but weren't significant enough to attract too much attention in any given environment.

With a few exceptions, these were people who were completely undervalued in the eyes of those whom Trump would likely consider his rivals and adversaries. They would look at somebody like Dennis Rodman and see a walking liability in every sense of the word, while Trump saw a 5-time NBA Champion from arguably the most popular squad of all time: the 1990's Chicago Bulls—who happened to be worshipped at the highest levels of the North Korean government. (A fact that was reported during the Clinton administration, when North Korean diplomats were still visiting the US.)

There were a number of such characters seen throughout the history of the show, and a startling number of them resurfaced in Trump's orbit before and during his first term as POTUS.

As contestants on the show, these characters were subjected to humiliating tasks such as selling cupcakes in Times Square, and Trump would exacerbate drama by probing observable tensions during his formal evaluations.

Trump took this to the next level by bringing in Omarosa as both a contestant and a consultant (a role filled by a rotating cast, including the Trump children) on several of the celebrity seasons. To her credit, Omarosa had parlayed her appearance in the first season into a career (of sorts) as a tabloid celebrity. She became notorious for her assertiveness and combative demeanor, and Trump utilized her abilities on his show.

When appearing as a contestant, Omarosa would intentionally seek conflict with the celebrities and then escalate the drama as much as possible. Trump would then pull her aside into his limousine, and she would brief him on the emotional intelligence of the celebrity contestants, and Trump would use that information during his evaluations to test their fortitude.

It was a ploy that the audience was fully read in on, and Trump repeatedly explained during his narrations that he sought "employees" (the grand prize of the entire contest) who performed well under pressure

I explain all of this because I think we are now watching the newest season of The Celebrity Apprentice, executed at the largest scale imaginable. And just like on the NBC version of the show, Trump is utilizing agent provocateurs tasked (wittingly or unwittingly) with instigating conflict so that Trump can force resolution— what I would call "The Trump Dialectic."

If you need further proof of this unconventional analysis, consider that after being sworn into office in January 2017, Trump immediately hired Omarosa to be both his personal assistant and director of communication at the Office of Public Liaison.

She was fired by Chief of Staff John Kelly in December of that year.

I think #OurGirl Meloni is another one of these provocateurs.

You may recall that in 2017, her now Deputy Prime Minister (Matteo Salvini) launched a new political party (Lega) that adopted the branding of the 2016 Trump campaign—right down to the templating of campaign signage.

Salvini and Lega were later placed under investigation by Italian and European authorities, who accused the group of allegiance to the Kremlin when financing for the party was allegedly connected to the Russian energy company Rosneft. (The same company now building nuclear power plants all over the world for the Sovereign Alliance.)

Lega aligned with Georgia Meloni's Brothers of Italy party (among others) in 2022 to elect her as Prime Minister, and the rest is history.

Now I think Meloni is playing the role of Omarosa—agent provocateur—instigating narrative conflict with Israel, which will likely lead to fracturing among the EU nations.

We could see Italy and others seek to leave the EU if their decision to cut ties with Israel is challenged by the continental authorities.

Accelerate.

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Hollywood Freaks Out Over Based Saudis Entering the Chat

Hollywood is split over a massive media mega-merger as Saudi Arabia pours billions into the industry.

On April 13, 2026, more than 1,000 writers, actors, and directors—including Bryan Cranston, Joaquin Phoenix, Tiffany Haddish, Lily Gladstone, Denis Villeneuve, and J.J. Abrams—signed an open letter opposing Paramount’s $111 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery.

Organized by advocacy groups, including the Committee for the First Amendment and the Future Film Coalition, the letter warns that the deal would accelerate industry consolidation, leading to fewer films produced, narrower story diversity, reduced job opportunities for creators, higher production costs, and less choice for global audiences.

The merger is being heavily financed by Gulf sovereign wealth funds, with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) committing approximately $12 billion as part of a $24 billion equity package alongside Qatar and Abu Dhabi investors. The funds are structured as passive stakes to ease U.S. regulatory review.

This Saudi investment is only the latest chapter in Riyadh’s aggressive, multi-billion-dollar push into Hollywood under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 diversification plan. Other recent moves include a PIF-led $55 billion acquisition of Electronic Arts in 2025, full control of MBC Group, a $1 billion studio partnership with Arena SNK, and funding for domestic film production, festivals (Riyadh Comedy Festival, Soundstorm, Red Sea International Film Festival), and theme-park IP development.

Paramount has defended the deal, saying it will preserve independent creative leadership and increase theatrical output.

Saudi officials and backers frame the broader strategy as soft-power rebranding, domestic entertainment for a young population, and political influence in Washington.

The letter’s signatories and Saudi financing underscore the high-stakes tension between creative independence and deep-pocketed foreign capital reshaping the entertainment landscape.

Burning Bright: The most important front in the Info War is that for American Culture, and it's being saved ... by the Saudis?

For generations, the old-guard American conservative apparatus stood by as this battlespace was methodically ceded to the enemy, watching institutions of narrative—film, television, publishing, the whole glittering edifice—tilt relentlessly toward engineered inversion.

And make no mistake: the Cultural Arm of the System of Systems has always been its most seismic weapon precisely because it doesn’t merely propagandize, but translates raw power into perceived legitimacy in the subconscious mind of the observer.

It codifies a counterfeit morality that seeps through the living tissue of fiction—stories that burrow beneath conscious skepticism and take root in the sub-reality where human belief systems actually form.

In an age where trust in every legacy gatekeeper has cratered across the spectrum, this osmotic process has only accelerated.

People stopped believing the news long ago, but they still crave the dream, the archetype, the emotional architecture that fiction provides. And that is why the machine has always poured its darkest energies here as deliberate command architecture, a cultural fifth-generation offensive that McCarthy glimpsed in outline nearly a century past and that the architects have since labored tirelessly to memory-hole and invert in the public mind.

And now, the same apparatus that spent years perfecting its breathless, exhaustive siege on a certain political awakening and the movement it birthed has, for the briefest of pauses, turned its fire inward.

Not because the external foe they've made of Trumpism has vanished, but because something far more existentially corrosive to them has materialized on the very near horizon: a convergence they cannot spin, cannot other and cannot contain.

The Trump-allied Ellisons’ audacious consolidation of a legacy studio powerhouse—Paramount Skydance’s $110 billion-plus absorption of Warner Bros. Discovery—would be a strategic threat enough on its own to the legacy Hollywood apparatus. But add the expansive financial scaffolding from Saudi sovereign capital and aligned Gulf partners committing tens of billions to anchor this deal and others beside it in the realms of sports and gaming, and the panic pattern becomes unmistakable, and well warranted.

This is no longer business as usual in the dream factories. This is a new front opening where they least expected it, a Sovereign Alliance maneuver that signals the System of Systems is losing its monopoly on the very machinery it once weaponized without contest.

Hollywood’s frantic coordination—manifest in an open letter from over a thousand writers, directors and performers decrying the merger as an existential gutting of creative independence, career pipelines and narrative diversity—reveals far more than it conceals.

They don’t fear consolidation in the abstract; they fear THIS consolidation and coordination.

They don’t dread foreign capital on principle; they dread capital that refuses to genuflect to their inverted morality.

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Appeals Court Orders End to Boasberg Contempt Probe

A divided D.C. federal appeals court has ordered U.S. District Judge James Boasberg to immediately end his criminal contempt probe against Trump administration officials over disputed 2025 deportation flights.

The contempt investigation stemmed from March 2025, when the Trump administration carried out deportation flights to El Salvador of Venezuelan migrants—including suspected members of the Tren de Aragua gang—despite Boasberg’s temporary restraining order directing the planes to turn around. Boasberg had previously found probable cause that senior officials, including then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, willfully violated his directive under the administration’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act.

In the majority opinion, Judges Neomi Rao and Justin Walker (Trump appointees) wrote that Boasberg’s effort to investigate “high-level Executive Branch deliberations about matters of national security and diplomacy” amounted to “a clear abuse of discretion” and had reached “a legal dead end.”

Judge Michelle Childs (Biden appointee) dissented in the sharply divided decision.

The outcome marks a major legal victory for the Trump White House in its ongoing clashes with the district judge over immigration enforcement and is reportedly the second time the appeals court has blocked Boasberg’s contempt efforts.

Ashe in America: “In Tuesday’s opinion, judges Neomi Rao and Justin Walker, wrote that the district court’s plan amounted to ‘a clear abuse’ of power, arguing the inquiry improperly targeted executive branch deliberations.”

Boasberg has been undermining the President and interfering in his agenda since before Inauguration Day. He’s the poster boy for #resist from the bench, especially since judge Hannah Dugan was removed last year for helping a prisoner evade ICE officers in her courtroom. That criminal invader was eventually deported, and Dugan was convicted.

Judges that blatantly abuse their power harm public trust in the process immeasurably.

Abusing judicial power to give aid and comfort to foreign enemies is just beyond. Boasberg should be removed; too bad Congress is paralyzed and incompetent.

Unfortunately, those are expected side effects of illegitimacy.

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US Hosts Israel-Lebanon Talks

The United States hosted the first high-level talks between Israel and Lebanon since 1993 on Tuesday.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio led the trilateral working-level meeting at the State Department, with Israeli Ambassador Yechiel Leiter and Lebanese Ambassador Nada Hamadeh Moawad participating.

The discussions marked a significant diplomatic breakthrough after more than three decades without direct high-level engagement between the two countries.

The talks focused on implementing the November 2024 ceasefire understanding, advancing steps toward formal direct negotiations, dismantling armed groups such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, strengthening the Lebanese state’s authority, and addressing humanitarian issues.

Israel expressed readiness for direct talks and reaffirmed its right to respond to Hezbollah attacks, while Lebanon urged full implementation of the prior ceasefire and resolution of the humanitarian situation.

The U.S. voiced support for Lebanon’s efforts to bolster state authority and for continued dialogue between the parties.

Both Israel and Lebanon agreed to proceed with direct negotiations, with the time and place to be determined later.

Rubio stressed that any ceasefire must be reached directly between Israel and Lebanon with U.S. involvement, positioning Washington as a facilitator amid ongoing regional tensions.

GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: You may recall the map that I shared in yesterday's edition of The Brief.

Here is aerial before/after footage of the attacks conducted by the IDF on the Lebanese town of Khiyam between March 3 (before) and April 13 (after).

The major announcement from yesterday's historic meeting—the first time Lebanon and Israel have ever formally met to discuss diplomacy—was that the two sides agreed that their common enemy is Hezbollah.

For context, here is footage of Israel's bombing of Beirut in 1982—before Hezbollah existed—when the IDF first tried to occupy Lebanon.

They ended up occupying southern Lebanon for 18 years, establishing a number of settlements. It was this occupation that provoked the formation of Hezbollah, first as a political movement and then as a counterinsurgency. The IDF was finally driven out in 2000.

For additional context, here is an interview with Efraim Halevy, who served as the 9th director of Mossad. Note the way that Halevy describes the relationship between the Israeli government and Al Qaeda—which he notes has never attacked Israel—and then the way he describes Hezbollah.

Clearly, in the eyes of Mossad, Hezbollah and Al Qaeda are two very different things. It is worth noting that the two groups fought on opposing sides throughout the Syrian Civil War (the conflict Halevy is describing) with Al Qaeda seeking to overthrow Assad and Hezbollah, along with Russia, defending him and Syria's sovereignty.

Simply put, Hezbollah and Al Qaeda hate one another, and have spent the past 15 years killing each other in a conflict where Israel sided with Al Qaeda, and Russia sided with Hezbollah.

It would seem that while Al Qaeda is a CIA/Mossad-created terrorist/mercenary group that operates around the world, Hezbollah appears to be a localized militia (receiving international support) that seeks to expel an ever-invading empire from its land.

We are told every day that Israel has a right to defend itself—saying otherwise is a hate speech violation—but apparently the Lebanese people do not. That is the epitome of moral relativism, and those who engage in it are being intellectually dishonest.

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Trump Signals End of Iran War While Mossad Chief Says Not Over Until Regime Falls

President Donald Trump declared on Tuesday, that the U.S.-Israel war with Iran is “very close to being over.”

In a Fox Business interview, Trump said Iran “wants to make a deal very badly” and warned that any agreement must prevent Tehran from retaining nuclear capabilities, adding that pulling out now would leave Iran needing “20 years to rebuild.”

Weekend talks in Pakistan collapsed after 21 hours with no breakthrough on denuclearization or enrichment, prompting the U.S. to impose a naval blockade on Iranian ports the same day; Trump nevertheless indicated indirect negotiations could resume within the next two days, possibly back in Islamabad or at another venue.

Mossad chief David Barnea, speaking at a Holocaust Remembrance Day ceremony, declared that Israel’s mission “isn’t over until the regime falls,” stating the radical Iranian regime “must disappear from the world.”

Barnea revealed Mossad had operated inside Tehran to supply precise targeting intelligence during the campaign, and said the agency’s responsibility would continue until regime change is achieved, even after the fighting ends.

The remarks underscore ongoing Israeli-U.S. alignment on weakening Iran while highlighting expectations that the conflict’s political goals extend beyond the current shaky two-week ceasefire.

GhostofBasedPatrickHenry: There are two separate plotlines unfolding:

The first one is the splitting of US-Israeli interests in the Middle East.

This is something that we have been discussing for years, and it finally appears to be happening. As President Trump signals an end to the Iran War—stating that a second round of peace talks could happen in Islamabad as soon as tomorrow (Thursday).

Maria Bartiromo posted a video of her leaving the White House late yesterday afternoon, claiming to have just concluded an interview with President Trump where he said that the Iran War is over. (She says that full interview will air this morning on her show on Fox Business.)

Mossad Director David Barnea, of course, says that Israel's war with Iran will continue until the regime falls. Surely, Barnea thinks that the US will continue to support Israel through that effort.

The second plotline that is unfolding right now is the glimpse into our future should we continue to support Israel's wars to establish their empire, which has made them an international pariah.

Pakistan delivered a devasting dressing down of Israel yesterday at the UN Security Council meeting. It was not a fiery speech; it was a very sober and well articulated rebuke of everything Israel has become, delivered in a calm and serene tone by an elderly diplomat.

“...[Israel] is an occupier that does not listen to anyone, that does not heed any advice, even from its friends—if there are any left..."

Pakistan is demanding that Israel withdraw completely from Lebanon, and it is supported by the rest of the world in saying that—including the entire Sovereign Alliance. It is worth noting that it was South Korea who gave Pakistan the floor to make this statement at Pakistan's request. What makes this significant is the fact that South Korea (as a proxy of the US) has always been a strong ally of Israel.

The world has grown tired of Israel's bullshit. They know that this is not a campaign of self-defense. This is a campaign of conquest to establish a new empire in the Middle East. And the cost of establishing this empire is the alienation of every nation on earth.

Given its proud complicity in this campaign, America will be left with no real friends, only vassals who feign their allegiance while praying in secret for our demise, so that they can reclaim their sovereignty and live in peace. It is the model that the Deep State established and we have lived under for decades.

You can have a Golden Age where all countries cooperate in tranquility to pursue prosperity, or you can have an empire where all countries are subjugated by the Israeli-American alliance. If you choose the latter, just know that you will have to stand on the throat of every nation in perpetuity, for that is what tyranny demands in order to secure itself from harm.

Simply put: You can have an alliance with Greater Israel, or you can have a Golden Age. You cannot have both.

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