NATIONAL HEADLINES

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As we all know, torrential rains triggered flash flooding in central Texas Friday, killing more than 100 people, including dozens of children who were at summer camps along the Guadalupe River. The river rose more than 20 feet in less than two hours. People are still missing.  As search and rescue continues, charities are on the ground providing aid. You can help by clicking HERE or using the form below.

Click here to read about how a coalition of senators from both sides of the aisle is sounding the alarm about what they see as a quiet but dangerous trend across America's heartland: Acres of farmland falling into foreign hands, with China leading the seizures.  The urgency behind their concern is driven by a stark trendline: Chinese agricultural investments in the U.S. have skyrocketed tenfold over the past decade, according to Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst, who has sponsored the 'Farmland Act.' 

Alarms sounded in the cockpit of a Southwest Airlines jet shortly after taking off from Hollywood Burbank airport near Los Angeles on Friday, prompting evasive maneuvers, the airline said in a statement.  Southwest Flight 1496, operating on a Boeing 737, took off just before noon local time on a short flight to Las Vegas. After less than six minutes in the air, a privately owned Hawker Hunter fighter jet, crossed less than two miles in front of it within a few hundred feet of its altitude, according to the flight tracking site Flightradar24.  Read the full story by clicking here.

Click here to read about how a woman in Arizona was sentenced Thursday to more than eight years in prison for hosting a so-called laptop farm that enabled North Korean cyber operatives to pose as remote IT workers at more than 300 U.S. companies.  The sentence is one of the largest handed down to a U.S. national for their role in the scheme, which has brought in hundreds of millions of dollars for the North Korean regime.

Our local San Antonio Zoo is bringing back gorillas for the first time in 30 years and the zoo is offering a first look at the new habitat where they will live.  Congo Falls is the name of the new home for gorillas, which will also include an educational center, a 30-foot waterfall, a pool for water play and a 70-foot gorilla tower for entire troupe of 8 lowland gorillas.  Click here for more on this great San Antonio story.  

The dense forests near West Yellowstone, Montana, concealed the wreckage of a small plane until an unlikely beacon — a smartwatch worn by one of the victims — helped search-and-rescue crews locate the crash site, officials said Monday.   Click here for the full story.  

A Delta pilot used extreme turns to avoid a collision with a USAF B-52 bomber.  A passenger praised the pilot for providing a highly detailed account of everything that had happened, and said she could tell by his voice he was shaken.  “He was very casual, if you can be casual about something like that, but you could tell he was stressed. He was almost shaking, trying to find the right words, but he was nice and detailed. It felt good that they weren’t just going to brush it off,”  Click here for more on this story.

The search continues in and around Kerr County, Texas for three victims of the early morning July 4th Guadalupe River flood which killed over 150 people.   This number was drastically reduced over the weekend.  Click here to learn why and more about this fantastic answer to a prayer.

Click here to learn more about how the Justice Department formally requested Friday the unsealing of grand jury records tied to federal investigations into Jeffrey Epstein, according to a court filing.  President Donald Trump announced the previous day that he ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi to seek the release of additional Epstein material following pushback from conservatives and others for more transparency in the case.  "At the direction of the Attorney General, the Department of Justice hereby moves the Court to release grand jury transcripts associated with the above-referenced indictment," the motion said.

Meanwhile,  in a related story, Top Senate Democrat Dick Durbin revealed that the FBI launched a massive operation to dig through the Epstein files and 'flag' any mention of Donald Trump.  Durbin said that about 1,000 FBI employees were ordered to work 24-hour shifts and review about 100,000 pages of documents related to the prosecution of Jeffrey Epstein.  Click here for more on that.

EDITORS NOTE:  As you know we typically try to find positive in national newz media.  That's hard to do with the Texas Flooding story.  But, as we are all in shock about our neighbors in Kerrville, Center Point, Hunt and all along the Guadalupe, tales of sacrifice and heroism are emerging:  

Julian Ryan’s final words to his mother as floodwaters quickly engulfed their trailer home were simply, “I love you.”  He had made a split-second decision to thrust his arm through a window to help his fiancée, two young kids and mom escape the catastrophic flood tearing through Kerr County, Texas, swallowing everything in its path.  That last-ditch effort, an act of bravery, ultimately cost him his life.  Click here to read this story.

"Camp Mystic’s Dick Eastland no doubt gave his life attempting to save his campers," Rep. August Pfluger, R-Texas, wrote on X. "For decades he and his wife Tweety poured his life into loving and developing girls and women of character. Thank you Mr. Eastland. We love you and miss you."