The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services threatened to withhold federal funding from Minnesota after fraudsters allegedly stole more than $1 billion set aside for Medicaid programs.
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| “This much you have taught me: that I should learn to take food as medicine.” |
— Augustine, "Confessions" |
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The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services threatened to withhold federal funding from Minnesota after fraudsters allegedly stole more than $1 billion set aside for Medicaid programs.
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COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna should be pulled from circulation, a former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director said in an interview with The Epoch Times.
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White House border czar Tom Homan said more than 60,000 children who were illegally smuggled into the United States have been located by the Trump administration and that some were rescued from dire situations, including sex trafficking and forced labor.
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An Obama-era race-based “restorative justice” policy is exacerbating the discipline crisis in public schools even after the Trump White House took steps to root it out from the education system.
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🐟 Health: This widely available canned fish is a nutrient powerhouse that boosts cardiometabolic and bone health.
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| Ivan Pentchoukov
National Editor (Email) |
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Good morning! It’s Monday. Thank you for reading the Morning Brief, an exclusive newsletter for Epoch Times subscribers. |
Pigeons fly outside Riverside Plaza, an apartment complex that is home to hundreds of Somali-Americans, in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood on December 4, 2025, in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
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The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services threatened to withhold federal funding from Minnesota after fraudsters allegedly stole more than $1 billion set aside for Medicaid programs.
CMS administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz ordered Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz to follow a series of guidelines that crack down on the fraud and said that if the state does not comply, it will lose federal money. “Either fix this in 60 days or start looking under your couch for spare change because we are done footing the bill for your incompetence,” Oz announced on Dec. 5. CMS will require Minnesota officials to provide weekly updates for six months on the actions it is taking to stop fraud and to freeze enrollment of high-risk providers.
The Minnesota Department of Human Services was also ordered to create a corrective action plan outlining how it will prevent fraud going forward. Oz wants this plan submitted by the end of December.
“Our staff at CMS told me they’ve never seen anything like this in Medicaid—and everyone from Gov. Tim Walz on down needs to be investigated, because they’ve been asleep at the wheel,” Oz wrote in a X post on Dec. 5. The Epoch Times reached out to Walz’s team for comment but did not hear back by publication time. The CMS administrator blamed “bad actors” in Minnesota’s Somali community for being part of the fraudulent activity. There are nearly 80,000 Somalis living in the state, with the majority of them in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul Twin Cities region, according to Minnesota Compass. Oz specifically alleged fraudsters targeted a housing program that was designed to help disabled homeless people and a program that reimbursed therapy costs for families who have children with autism. (More) More Politics: |
- President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Dec. 6 establishing security task forces within the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission to protect competition across the U.S. food supply chain.
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Secretary of War Pete Hegseth articulated the emerging “America First” national defense strategy of President Donald Trump’s second term in a keynote speech before the 2025 Reagan National Defense Forum.
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David Rein presumed punishment would follow after a bully on the school bus shoved his middle school son around, ordered him where to sit, and broke his glasses. Months later, after learning three other students had received the same treatment at the school in upstate New York, Rein was told the tormentor got a free pass under the school’s “restorative justice” policies. His son never received an apology, Rein said. “They swept it under the rug.” The school district in Newburgh, New York, is among more than 1,450 districts—serving around 19 million students across all 50 states—that use restorative justice practices. Those numbers are according to district websites and Defending Education, an organization that tracks left-leaning policies in public education.
A primary goal of the restorative justice approach is to reduce suspension rates for black and Hispanic students; an article on restorative justice in the journal of the National Education Association states that traditional disciplinary policies “often are nourished by implicit biases and institutionalized racism.”
Like many parents, Rein wasn’t even aware his son’s school had such policies—much less that they are adopted so widely nationwide. “I can understand a get-out-of-jail free for a first offense, but if it happens over and over and over again, it’s not restorative,” Rein told The Epoch Times. “It’s abusive to society.” President Donald Trump targeted such policies earlier this year in an executive order that stated the government will no longer tolerate risks to children from school discipline “based on discriminatory and unlawful ‘equity ideology.’”
The practices found their way into school policies almost two decades ago, and became tied to federal funding during the Obama administration. (More)
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Dec. 7 said the cease-fire brokered between Israel and the Hamas terrorist group nearly two months ago will soon move to its next scheduled phase.
Netanyahu said the cease-fire was “very shortly expected to move into [its] second phase,” which he said entails disarming Hamas and demilitarizing the Gaza Strip. That process, he said, may start at the end of December. The prime minister made the remarks during a news conference with visiting German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Tel Aviv, Israel.
“We’re about to finish the first stage,” Netanyahu said. “But we have to make sure that we achieve the same results in the second stage, and that’s something I look forward to discussing with President Trump.” U.S. President Donald Trump and Netanyahu are scheduled to have a meeting on the conflict and cease-fire next month, Netanyahu said. Netanyahu stressed that the disarming of Hamas is important. It has been more than two years since the terrorist organization launched a series of attacks against Israel, killing more than 1,200 Israeli citizens and taking more than 250 hostages, including U.S. citizens.
Hamas must also comply with the “commitment which [it] undertook to disarm and have Gaza demilitarize,” Netanyahu said. (More) More World News: |
- U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and several other senior U.S. officials have criticized the internet policies of the European Union, likening them to censorship, after the governing bloc last week levied Elon Musk’s social media platform X with a $140 million fine for breaching its online content rules.
- Chinese fighter jets used radar to lock onto Japanese fighter planes over Okinawa Island.
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The Philippine Coast Guard said Chinese vessels fired three flares toward its patrol plane conducting a routine flight in the disputed South China Sea on Dec. 6.
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China will start taxing condoms and other contraceptives for the first time in three decades, as it searches for ways to lift one of the world’s lowest birth rates.
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First Lady Melania Trump, accompanied by two children patients Faith Hinkle (L) and Riley Whitney (R), reads “How Does Santa Go Down the Chimney?” by Mac Barnett, illustrated by Jon Klassen, during a visit to the Children's National Hospital in Washington on Dec. 5, 2025. (Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times) |
📸 America in Photos: First Lady Reading, King Tide, and Cold Moon Rising (Look)
🎙️ Podcast: Obesity in children is not a character flaw—it’s shaped by biology, environment, and family habits—all of which parents have the power to change.—The Report (Listen)
🎤 Interview: Robert Kiyosaki: Why America’s Middle Class Keeps Getting Poorer (Watch) ✍️ Opinion |
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This Country Proves Russia and China Are Not on the Same Team—by Tamuz Itai (Read)
- The Lost Art of Medicine—by Mollie Engelhart (Read)
- ‘Iryna’s Law’ and the Bad Decisions That Make It Necessary—by Daniel McCarthy (Read)
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🎵 Music: Mozart - Concerto For Violin, Piano & Orchestra (Listen) |
(Illustration by The Epoch Times, Shutterstock) |
Once relegated to the back of the pantry as an “in case of emergency” food, sardines are celebrating a culinary resurgence. Upscale tinned-fish boutiques have popped up in cities like New York, offering curated selections of sardines from Portugal and Spain, giving the humble little fish an unexpected cultural spotlight.
Behind the trend is a growing appreciation for foods that are both budget-friendly and healthy—qualities sardines have always had. In fact, sardines are one of the most nutrient-dense foods.
“Sardines are a complete protein source, similar in comparison to foods such as eggs, dairy, and meats,” Helen Tieu, a registered dietitian and certified diabetes educator, told The Epoch Times in an email. “They contain all 20 amino acids and are rich in omega-3 fatty acids.”
“Sardines are a nutrient powerhouse,” added Tieu. In addition to protein, they are especially high in: Omega-3 Fatty Acids: Sardines are a strong source of EPA and DHA. A three-ounce tin contains about 1.2 grams, making two servings of sardines a week a great way to get ample amounts in your diet. Vitamin D: One can of sardines typically provides about 150 to 200 international units (IU) of vitamin D. For comparison, a glass of fortified milk contains about 100 IU, and an egg yolk has just 20.
Calcium: 100 grams of sardines (the amount in a standard tin) offers 382 milligrams of calcium, which is equivalent to more than a cup and a half of milk or about 13.5 ounces.
Vitamin B12: Tieu noted that just one can of sardines provides about three to four times what adults need. “This would be a good option to ensure adequate vitamin B12 intake, particularly for pescatarians.” (More)
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Thanks for reading 🙏 Have a wonderful day! |
—Ivan Pentchoukov, Madalina Hubert, and Kenzi Li. |
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