Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has declared a state of emergency for three months in 10 of Turkey’s 81 provinces after Monday’s catastrophic 4 a.m. earthquake. The death toll rose Tuesday evening to 5,434 in Turkey and 1,832 in Syria after the 7.8 quake, the deadliest to hit Turkey in over 20 years. The initial quake was followed by deadly aftershocks of up to 7.5 magnitude, and icy weather has impeded search and rescue efforts. Almost 6,000 buildings were razed.

Former President Trump and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie sparred online today after Christie predicted that Trump couldn’t beat President Biden if they run against each other in the 2024 presidential election, The Hill reports.
Christie, who endorsed Trump in 2016 after dropping his own campaign for the presidency but has since become a vocal Trump critic, made the 2024 forecast Sunday on ABC News, where he is now a contributor.

Ilhan Omar was kicked off the Foreign Affairs Committee —and AOC lost it.

Democratic Socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) had a melt down on the House floor on Thursday after a vote kicked Ilhan Omar off the Foreign Affairs Committee for past racist comments.
AOC challenged the GOP narrative that it was being “consistent” with past practices.
“Consistency? There is nothing consistent with the Republican Party’s continued attack, except for the racism and incitement of violence against women of color in this body,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “This is about targeting women of color in the United States of America.”
Watch the clip above.

Always know the person’s name before you start the song.

According to a report from The New York Post, President Biden went down in flames while tyring to sing “Happy Birthday” to 49-year-old Arndrea Waters King, daughter-in-law of Martin Luther King Jr., during an event organized by Al Sharpton’s National Action Network and co-chaired by Martin Luther King III.

From The New York Post:

The Biden administration again renewed the Covid-19 public health emergency, a provision that gives the administration authorities to respond to the pandemic as cases are again on the rise, CNN reports.
US Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra renewed the declaration on its expiration date – an expected step because officials have said they will provide 60 days’ notice if they do not plan to renew the emergency, and had not done so.

Air Force One touched down in El Paso, Texas, on Sunday afternoon as President Biden made his first trip to the beleaguered Mexican border since he took office two years ago — for a brief three hour visit, the NY Post reports.
Biden, 80, who is said to be “all in” on a reelection run in 2024 and is expected to announce his intentions in a couple of weeks, has been roundly criticized for his failure to control the number of migrants crossing the border into the US and for repealing a number of programs begun by former President Donald Trump that led to the escalation.

During an interview with CBS News on Friday, Bank of America Chief Economist Michael Gapen stated that it “will probably take two years, if not three years to get inflation back down to the Fed’s desired 2% level.”
Gapen said, “I think the numbers tell us that the labor market is still quite hot. The unemployment rate number that you mentioned is the lowest we’ve seen since 1968. So, it’s about a five-decade low. 223,000 jobs added in the month of December. That pace has come down, but that’s a robust number in any normal expansion. So, I think job-seekers right now are probably still meeting with a lot of success and I think labor demand remains exceptionally strong.”

Agudath Israel Welcomes the Inclusion of Many Community Priorities in Omnibus Bill

A moving video shown at the 1st anniversary celebration for Sholom Mordechai Rubashkin recounts the worldwide effort to help him in his plight and the joyous and unified joy at his miraculous release.
WATCH:

[COMMUNICATED]
It is the dirty secret that everyone knows but few are ready to discuss publicly. The secret is the exponential increase of antisemitism in America today. While overt antisemitism was once reduced to fringes of discourse, today it has become almost acceptable in quarters of the far right and sadly even more so on the progressive left. 
It has become acceptable in universities to marginalize Jews and discriminate against them, using Israel is a convenient scapegoat by claiming to be anti-Zionist, not anti-Jewish.  
Even worse, prominent entertainers and sports figures feel comfortable spewing the most vile, antisemitic tropes without being ostracized from civilized company.