🔺 "If you're afraid of transparency, you're part of the problem" - Pennsylvania Senator Doug Mastriano attacks state Democrats for resisting an election audit.

🔺 Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said he supports election audits in several Texas counties.

🔺 The lawyer claims that prisoners are brutally beaten, stripped, twisted, humiliated, and one inmate was blinded in one eye after "storming" the Capitol. "This is more brutal treatment than Gitmo."

🔺 A former DEA agent told Tucker Carlson that a "friend" and part-time FBI informant invited him to the Capitol on January 6 and forced him to go inside.

🔺 "We must return from flexibility to strict measures," Turkish Health Ministry head Kocja wrote on Twitter, urging those who have not already done so to be vaccinated immediately.

🔺 The COVID-19 "Delta" strain will dominate the world in the coming months. This is according to a joint release from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and the WHO.

🔺 Florida is asking the Supreme Court to issue an emergency order blocking CDC COVID-19 rules for cruise ships.

🔺 Texas Governor Gregg Abbott: "Texas has begun arresting illegal immigrants trespassing in the state or destroying property and fences. Now they are being sent to this prison, not released as the Biden administration did."

🔺 The bishop overseeing Nancy Pelosi's home diocese condemns her, saying, "No one can claim to be a devout Catholic and justify killing innocent people, let alone have the government pay for it."

🔺 U.S. Justice Department dropped cases against five visiting researchers accused of hiding their ties to China's military, "as some FBI analysts question the value of the cases" (WSJ)

🔺 Ministry of Labor of the Russian Federation: "The number of vaccinated in the team must be at least 80% to stabilize the situation.

🔺 India plans to begin vaccinating children against the coronavirus by September 2021. The government has previously said it plans to vaccinate all adults in the country by the end of this year.

🔺 More than 275 protests in different locations in France are scheduled for today.

🔺 "This is the biggest bubble I've seen in my career" - Democrats' infrastructure spending could lead to a devastating setback in the economy, warns billionaire investor Stanley Druckenmiller.

🔺 Offensive line coach for the Minnesota Vikings baseball team, Rick Dennison, has left his position due to his refusal to get vaccinated.

🔺 Austria's interior minister and defense minister announced at a joint press conference that the country would tighten its border security because "the European asylum system has failed. Austria will send hundreds of soldiers to the borders. "The situation is serious," said Interior Minister Karl Nehammer.