A high-rise apartment building partially collapsed after a suspected gas explosion in New York City on Wednesday.
Part of a 17-story New York City apartment building collapsed Wednesday after what officials believe was a gas explosion.
No injuries were reported in the incident at a New York City Housing Authority Mitchel Houses building located on Alexander Avenue in the Mott Haven section of the Bronx, according to WABC-TV.
Drones and dogs were being used to search for anyone who might have been injured by falling debris. The building is located across the street from a school.
The building was evacuated after the explosion, which took place at about 8 a.m..
It was not clear early Wednesday if tenants would be able to return to their apartments.
News 12 The Bronx reported that the part of the building that collapsed was the towering structure’s incinerator shaft.
The outlet reported that it was told by building residents that the boiler and a section of the building where pipes run from it were damaged in the explosion.Residents said that the smell of gas has been prevalent in recent days.
“Today is very strong,” one resident said. “I feel so scared. I don’t want to live there anymore, because we have a lot of complaints. But they don’t pay mind.”
Witness Diamond Freeman said she heard a “big boom,” according to WPIX-TV.
“When you looked out, the whole building just went boom, it fell. Then you heard another boom, and all the side of the building just fell. It was crazy. All you see is smoke,” she said.
Speaker Emerita Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) got so agitated that her jewelry could be heard rattling as she angrily waved her hand in the face of a reporter on Capitol Hill Wednesday who dared to ask her about Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) telling Republicans to come to her office to negotiate directly with her over the government shutdown.
Pelosi was asked about a statement Ocasio-Cortez made on MSNBC Tuesday night, which was posted by the Democratic Party’s messaging account Fact Post:
“AOC’s message to the GOP: My office is open and you are free to negotiate with me directly. What I’m not going to do is tolerate 4 million uninsured Americans because Trump decided one day to make sure kids are dying because they don’t have insurance.”
When Pelosi was asked about Republicans saying Ocasio-Cortez appeared to be directing the shutdown, she got so agitated her jewelry could be heard rattling as she angrily waved her hand in the face of the reporter while she fired back, taking a shot at Ocasio-Cortez by implying she lacks the experience to lead the shutdown.
Video clip posted by Greg Price:
A longer clip posted by the Washington Examiner (with better audio of the rattling jewelry and visual of the large band-aid on her hand) shows Pelosi was defending Jeffries’ leadership before the reporter asked her about Ocasio-Cortez:
The press dynamic is also of interest here. Pelosi was asked a t-ball question about Jeffries’ leadership which she happily answered, closing by telling the assembled reporters they should be putting out stories about Jeffries’ “greatness.”
That is usually how Democrats and the press interact on Capitol Hill. It is rare that a reporter will risk Pelosi’s wrath (and the scorn of fellow reporters) for going against the Democrat narrative.
A very brave reporter followed the t-ball question with a hardball question about Ocasio-Cortez, setting Pelosi off in a barely controlled rage. But the reporter held her ground, in a respectful way.
Perhaps Pelosi was having flashbacks to the last government shutdown in January, 2019 when President Trump abruptly canceled her use of a military jet for a Congressional trip to Belgium and Afghanistan, dumping her luggage at the door of her Congressional office:
Along with paper plates and a bag of rice, a woman in Newburgh, Maine, received 250 state election ballots, reports The MainWire.
These arrived about a month before Maine will vote in a statewide referendum to decide whether or not to join 36 other states in requiring some form of Voter ID.
A preliminary look at the ballots by election officials, which arrived sealed in packages of 50, concluded that these are legal ballots. Which, as the report points out, begs the following question: “What assurances do Mainers have that hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of ballots aren’t currently floating around unsecured locations waiting to be filled out and deposited in unmonitored ballot drop boxes throughout the state?”
Already, Ben Midgley, a Republican candidate for Maine’s 2026 gubernatorial race, has released a statement calling for a criminal investigation:
This ballot scandal demands a full criminal investigation, immediately. We need to know exactly what Shenna Bellows was saying in her texts and phone calls, who the Amazon driver was, and how ballots ended up in an Amazon box with no clear chain of custody. This is not the first scandal to occur under Shenna Bellows, as she spent taxpayer dollars trying to keep President Trump off the Maine ballot just a few months ago. Mainers deserve the truth, and they deserve it now.
On top of the drop box concern, there are two additional concerns: 1) that these 250 ballots somehow fell outside regulations surrounding a required chain of custody, and 2) that state elections are run by that state’s Secretary of State and, in this case, Maine’s Secretary of State is an unhinged leftist.
To the chain of custody point…
“Under state law, the Secretary of State’s Office designs, approves, and oversees distribution of ballots,” reports Maine Wire. “Ballots must be printed on secure paper, shipped in sealed units, and delivered directly to municipal offices under strict chain-of-custody rules.”
Not only did this unidentified woman receive these ballots in an Amazon box, but if you look at the photos in the article, the box is a mess. It looks as though it was sealed and then resealed. The woman who received the ballots said this was how the box looked when it was delivered.
How in the hell…?
The context here is crucial: These are the ballots for the upcoming November 4 vote that will decide whether or not Voter ID will be required in future elections.
Here’s more context… Maine Democrats have already admitted that Voter ID will cost them 13,000 statewide votes. This 13,000 loss is being used by Maine Democratic Party Chairman Charlie Dingman to scare people into voting against the referendum. In a text message to voters earlier this year, Dingman complained Voter ID “could result in a loss of 13,000 Democratic” votes.
Why?
Why would requiring a valid ID to vote kill 13,000 Democrat votes? That question he won’t answer, which brings us to Maine’s reprehensible Secretary of State, Shenna Bellows, a partisan Democrat refusing to resign even as she campaigns for the Democrat nomination in next year’s governor’s race. This means she will oversee her own election.
Bellows is so toxic, she attempted to keep President Trump off of Maine’s 2024 general election ballot.
She’s so toxic, here’s how she worded the Voter ID question on this ballot:
Do you want to change Maine election laws to eliminate two days of absentee voting, prohibit requests for absentee ballots by phone or family members, end ongoing absentee voter status for seniors and people with disabilities, ban prepaid postage on absentee ballot return envelopes, limit the number of drop boxes, require voters to show certain photo ID before voting, and make other changes to our elections?
She’s so toxic, she spoke at a conference that had the stated goal of allowing non-citizens to vote in Maine’s local and state-wide elections:
She’s so toxic, she refuses to follow the law and turn Maine’s voter rolls over to the Justice Department, even as she admits some non-citizens are on the voter rolls:
The Democrat Party is currently one that has made no secret of its desire to permanently mutilate little kids to appease their trans gods, empty the prisons of violent criminals, and flood America with millions of unvetted, third world, illegal aliens… Do you honestly believe this is a party above shipping hundreds, or thousands, or even tens of thousands of ballots to leftist activists who will fill them out and drop them in unsecured drop boxes — especially with Voter ID on the ballot?
Come on now… We are awake to who it is we are dealing with.
The fact that an illegal alien ended up as the superintendent of the Des Moines school district reveals the critical need for states to mandate E-Verify.
It’s one of the crazier stories to hit the newswire of late, but then again, it’s entirely believable given the policy position of Democrat lawmakers when it comes to illegal immigration.
Last week, Ian Andre Roberts was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. Roberts was no ordinary suspect, however. He had been working as the superintendent of Des Moines Public Schools at the time of his arrest, a tenured position he had been hired for back in 2023.
It turns out that Roberts is an illegal alien and has been since his student visa, on which he entered the U.S. from his home country of Guyana, expired — in 1999.
At the time of Roberts’s arrest, he attempted to evade ICE officers and was found hiding in the woods not far from his vehicle, in which was found $3,000 and a loaded handgun. It is against the law for any illegal alien to possess a firearm.
Since Roberts’s arrest, Iowa has revoked his teaching license, and the school board placed him on unpaid leave. He is resigning today. Roberts reportedly defied a deportation order last year, which prompted ICE to track him down.
Of course, the big question on everyone’s mind is how an illegal alien not only gained employment as a teacher but also secured a position as superintendent in Iowa’s largest school district.
Veteran political analyst Byron York ponders, “How was the Des Moines school board so fooled by superintendent Ian Roberts, now in ICE custody? It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that they just believed what they wanted to believe.”
According to the school board chair, Jackie Norris, Roberts claimed to be a citizen. He filled out a Homeland Security I-9 form, presented a valid driver’s license, and provided a Social Security card. From there, the school district effectively took Roberts at his word and didn’t bother to confirm his legal status with E-Verify. Norris noted, “Two things can be true at the same time. Dr. Roberts was an effective and well-respected leader, and there are serious questions related to his citizenship and ability to legally perform his duties as superintendent.”
As Rosemary Jenks, policy director at the Immigration Accountability Project, observes, “Every school district in the United States should be using E-Verify, if simply to protect the children they are responsible for.” At the federal level, E-Verify is mandated, but not all states require it. That includes Iowa, as a mandatory E-Verify bill failed to pass the Republican-controlled legislature.
This episode is remarkable in its exposure of failure, but Iowa isn’t the worst or only problem. Roberts’s deception is tied to other states, including Maryland, Missouri, and California — all places where he worked in school districts.
The attitude of many Democrat-run states that have adopted “sanctuary” policies is the notion that no one is “illegal.” Based upon this flawed concept, they have gone out of their way to avoid expressing the distinction between legal and illegal residents. This, of course, only invites lawlessness and situations like this.
The Department of Homeland Security observed that not only had Roberts sought to evade deportation and arrest for years, but there was a 2020 weapons possession charge on his record. “This should be a wake-up call for our communities to the great work that our officers are doing every day to remove public safety threats,” stated Sam Olson, ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations director for St. Paul. It has also come to light that Roberts has an active voter registration as a Democrat in Maryland. This is precisely why efforts to ensure voter integrity are so important.
This entire episode highlights the numerous problems that arise from authorities’ failure to uphold and enforce the law. With Democrats objecting to ICE operations across the country, one can only conclude that they support this lawlessness.
OMB Director Russ Vought on “Fox News Sunday” 6/8/25
Office of Management and Budget Director (OMB) Russ Vought has been officially unleashed following the Democratic shutdown and is instantly making the Senate Minority Leader and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries regret the decision.
As The Gateway Pundit reported, the Schumer Shutdown took effect at 12:01 am after two measures to avert the government shutdown failed in the Senate.
The measures needed 60 votes to pass. The GOP-backed measure failed to pass in a 55-45 vote – Rand Paul voted with the Democrats.
The Democrat Party and Paul decided to put the welfare of illegal aliens, surgeries for transgender minors, and more garbage ahead of keeping the government running.
What a disgrace.
Thanks to Schumer’s selfish move, his own constituents are now paying a painful price. Vought announced this morning on X that he had frozen about $18 BILLION in infrastructure projects for New York City, saying he was trying to ensure such funding would not go to fund DEI projects.
“Roughly $18 billion in New York City infrastructure projects have been put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing based on unconstitutional DEI principles,” Vought wrote.
“More info to come soon from @USDOT.”
Vought later clarified that the money frozen was for the Hudson Tunnel Project and the Second Ave Subway.
Should Democrats continue the shutdown, the pain will likely only increase. It is time to end it and work with President Trump on a long-term funding bill.
