TV News LIES

Three artists have now dropped out of Kid Rock's 2026 Rock the Country tour.

After rapper Ludacris said in mid-January he would not be on the festival tour, headlined by Rock and other vocal conservatives including Jason Aldean, two more artists – country singers Morgan Wade and Carter Faith – have reportedly backed out of the lineup.

Days after the lineup – which also includes Blake Shelton, Jelly Roll, Creed, Brooks & Dunn, Miranda Lambert, Lynard Skynard and Nelly – was revealed on Monday, Jan. 12, a rep for Ludacris, 48, told Rolling Stone that the inclusion of the rapper was "a mix-up. Lines got crossed and he wasn't supposed to be on there." Media personality Ebro Darden also relayed the message that the rapper was "never" booked on the lineup.

The clarification came after uproar from fans, who reacted in confusion to Ludacris' appearance. Fellow rapper Nelly has also faced similar backlash for performing on conservative stages in the past, including at the first Rock the Country festival and at President Donald Trump's inauguration.

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A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration from detaining refugees in Minnesota, following a spate of arrests in the state.

More than 100 refugees who had lawfully resettled in the state had been arrested in recent weeks, according to attorneys and advocacy groups. Some were flown to detention centers in Texas, according to attorneys representing the cases, and then were abruptly released – and left to find and pay their own way back home.

On Wednesday, US district judge John R Tunheim ordered the administration to temporarily halt the arrest and detention of lawfully resettled refugees, while a lawsuit about the administration’s policy of “re-vetting” this population continued. The judge mandated the immediate release of all detained refugees in Minnesota and the release of those taken to Texas within five days.

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A high-ranking Catholic leader and prominent ally to Pope Leo XIV offered a strongly worded condemnation of President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigrants this week while encouraging more people of faith to speak out against it.

Cardinal Joseph Tobin of Newark, New Jersey, was one of several religious leaders to take part in an online prayer service organized by Faith in Action in response to the Jan. 24 shooting of Minneapolis resident Alex Pretti.

In excerpts of his remarks, Tobin urged Congress to “vote against renewing funding for such a lawless organization,” referring to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.

“We mourn for a world, a country that allows 5-year-olds to be legally kidnapped and protesters to be slaughtered,” he said. “How will you say no to violence? Because as the great teacher Martin Luther King said, ‘Hate cannot drive out hate. Only love can do that.’”

Elsewhere in the service, Tobin referenced Ignazio Silone’s 1936 novel “Bread and Wine,” which was written while the author was living in exile from his native Italy during dictator Benito Mussolini’s regime.

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Bruce Springsteen seems equal parts outraged and inspired by the unrest and violence in Minneapolis.

So much so that on Saturday — the same day that Alex Pretti, the 37-year-old intensive care nurse who was fatally shot by federal agents during an Immigration and Customs Enforcement protest — the Boss began writing a song “dedicated to the people” of the city, Springsteen said Wednesday in a post on Bluesky.

“Recorded it yesterday and released it to you today in response to the state terror being visited on the city of Minneapolis,” he wrote on the social media platform. “It’s dedicated to the people of Minneapolis, our innocent immigrant neighbors and in memory of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Stay free”

Pretti and Good, who was killed earlier this month by an ICE officer, are both name-checked in the lyrics of the song, “Streets Of Minneapolis.” So is “King Trump,” his “federal thugs,” White House senior adviser Stephen Miller and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem.

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A framed picture of President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin hangs in the White House, a photo taken by Bloomberg photographer Kent Nishimura in the Palm Room on Tuesday shows.

The Palm Room connects the West Wing to the White House residence and primarily serves as a lobby, according to the New York Times.

The Palm Room connects the West Wing to the White House residence and primarily serves as a lobby, according to the New York Times.

The eyebrow-raising framed photograph in question hangs above a photo of Trump and one of his grandchildren.

Given Trump’s obsession with photos of leaders, it’s almost certainly not an oversight.

According to HuffPost White House correspondent S.V. Dáte, Trump hung up a picture of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in the West Wing in his first term. When he vacated the residence, Trump found a new home for the photo: the bar at Trump Tower in New York.

Last year, Trump had staffers move former President Barack Obama’s official portrait to a corner where most people wouldn’t be able to see it. He did the same with the portraits of former Presidents George W. Bush and George H.W. Bush.

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The FBI on Wednesday searched the election office of a Georgia county that has been central to right-wing conspiracy theories over President Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss, acting just one week after the Republican leader predicted prosecutions over a contest he has baselessly insisted was tainted by widespread fraud.

The search at Fulton County’s main election facility in Union City sought records related to the 2020 election, county spokesperson Jessica Corbitt-Dominguez said. It appeared to be the most public step by law enforcement to pursue Trump’s claims of a stolen election, grievances rejected time and again by courts and state and federal officials, who found no evidence of fraud that would have altered the outcome.

It also unfolds against the backdrop of FBI and Justice Department efforts to investigate perceived political enemies of Trump, including former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

Trump has for years focused on Fulton, Georgia’s most populous county and a Democratic stronghold, as a key example of what he claims went wrong in the 2020 election. His pressure campaign there culminated in a sweeping state indictment accusing him and 18 others of illegally trying to overturn the vote.

An FBI spokesperson said agents were “executing a court authorized law enforcement action” at the county’s main election office in Union City, just south of Atlanta. The spokesperson declined to provide any further information, citing an ongoing matter.

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