Guggenheim upgrades Bristol Myers Squibb to buy, citing promising drug pipeline and potential 21% upside
Friday, December 12, 2025
Ascendis Pharma (ASND) Faces Acquisition Rumor
Ascendis Pharma (ASND) has become the center of speculation due to acquisition rumors circulating in financial circles. The buzz around a possible takeover was notably mentioned in a recent piece from Ben Harrington's blog, which focuses on mergers and acquisitions. This development has drawn the attention of investors, keenly observing any potential impact on the company's stock performance and future prospects. The outcome of such a move could significantly influence Ascendis Pharma’s strategic direction and market valuation.
Homan Announces Investigation Into Rep. Omar: A Case For Fraud Or Defamation?
This week, the lingering allegations over the marital history of Rep. Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) took an ominous step when Border Tsar Tom Homan publicly acknowledged that the government is looking into the matter.
Rep. Omar has long denied that she married her brother to gain his entry into the United States, but the allegation has continued to rage on the Internet and among her critics.
The question is whether this is a substantive case of fraud or defamation.
Homan stated that he was investigating whether Omar committed immigration fraud, but also noted that the statute of limitations has been an issue.
In his comment to Newsmax, Homan stated:
“I just got advised by a fraud investigator the other day on that. I asked the question, can we review the files? You know, there was immigration fraud involved. The statute of limitation became an issue in the last four years when this was first brought up…Pulling the records now, pulling the files, and we’re looking at it. But this fraud investigator, who I know personally, one of the best fraud investigators in HSI, Homeland Security Investigations, said there’s no doubt he’d review the file. So, I’m running that down this week as a matter of fact, and we’ll see.”
According to her congressional biography, Omar came to the United States with her family in the 1990s. As I have previously noted, the election of a young immigrant to Congress is genuinely remarkable and commendable.
The questions arose regarding her marriage to Ahmed Elmi in 2009. Elmi was back in the news this week with postings highlighting his lifestyle as a “dirty dandy.” Critics charged that he is actually her brother. The couple divorced in 2017, and no DNA evidence has been offered to support the claim that they are siblings.
President Donald Trump and others have been ratcheting up the rhetoric against Omar and the Somali population in Minnesota. Many of us have objected to some of the attacks on Omar as offensive. As I have previously written, the call for foreign-born U.S. citizens to “go back to their own country” has been made for decades against foreign-born U.S. citizens. However, such attacks are generally protected speech.
The allegation against Rep. Omar is not opinion, but a statement of fact.
Many news organizations have referred to the allegation as “debunked” and “unsupported.”
In defamation, truth is a defense. The truth of the matter, however, has never been easy to establish. In fairness to Rep. Omar, a person should not be in a position of having to “prove a negative.” It is not her obligation to prove that she is not a fraud or that she did not marry her brother. Her critics have never produced compelling evidence to support the claim.
Despite years of such statements by various people, Omar has never sued for defamation. It is a curious omission, since a successful lawsuit would dramatically reduce such claims, and even as a public official she could likely show actual malice in many of her critics.
Conversely, such litigation would also expose Omar to a lengthy discovery process regarding her family’s immigration history and related family issues.
I have taught defamation for over three decades, and it is rare for such an allegation to linger without some legal action by the subject. On its face, this would be a strong defamation case if the allegation is false.
The allegation would fall into one of the “per se” categories of defamation. Under the common law, these per se categories of defamation allow for presumed damages and include: (1) disparaging a person’s professional character or standing; (2) alleging a person is unchaste; (3) alleging that a person has committed a criminal act or act of moral turpitude; (4) alleging a person has a sexual or loathsome disease; and (5) attacking a person’s business or professional reputation. The language differs among the states, but the Omar allegation would constitute a criminal act as well as an attack on her character and reputation.
As a threshold matter, Omar would face a higher standard of proof due to her status as a public official. In New York Times v. Sullivan, the Supreme Court established the actual malice standard, requiring public officials to shoulder the higher burden of proving defamation. Under that standard, an official would have to show either actual knowledge of its falsity or a reckless disregard of the truth. That standard was later extended to public figures.
Many critics are calling the “allegations” worthy of investigation. That is certainly protected. However, it is common to see people on television claim that she married her brother as a factual statement.
The publication of DNA results would disprove these allegations. (There are no allegations of an adopted status for the brother).
If such evidence exists, it would not just be conclusive but compelling for a jury. The question is why Omar has not elected to bring such a case, given the vast array of choices of potential defendants within the statute of limitations. It is a target-rich environment for a defamation lawyer.
As for the president, he has continued to raise the allegation: “If I married my sister to get my citizenship, do you think I’d last for about two hours or something less than that? She married her brother to get in. Therefore, she’s here illegally. She should get the hell out.”
However, he would not be a good target for such an action. The Federal Tort Claims Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2680(h), expressly bars libel, slander, or defamation claims against the United States or a federal employee acting within the scope of their employment. It is possible to sue a government employee acting outside of the scope of their employment. However, the Westfall Act protects federal employees from personal lawsuits for torts committed within the scope of their employment and substitutes the U.S. government as the defendant under the FTCA. Since the FTCA bars liability, it works to force dismissal in cases.
Moreover, this is not just another federal employee. The President also has immunity under Article II and prevailing Supreme Court caselaw. In 1982, the Supreme Court handed down Nixon v. Fitzgerald, holding that former President Richard Nixon was immune from civil suits concerning actions within the “outer perimeter” of his official duties. In 1997, the Court ruled in Clinton v. Jones that President Bill Clinton was not immune from a civil suit filed by Paula Jones — who had accused Clinton of sexual harassment — because the case involved unofficial conduct on the part of the president.
This issue is still being litigated in the case of E. Jean Carroll, who won a significant civil award against the President in New York. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit rejected the applicability of the 2024 Supreme Court ruling recognizing broad criminal immunity for former presidents as inapplicable to the civil case.
These are statements being made during a presidency and can be claimed as privileged and immune by President Trump.
The same cannot be said for a myriad of pundits and commentators who have stated this allegation as fact.
In the end, such litigation would come down to truth as a defense. These critics are saying that Omar did marry her brother. Even if they did not have a good-faith basis for the assertion, proof that it was indeed true would still be a complete defense.
On the other hand, a defamation lawsuit could offer a dispositive judgment of a court on this lingering question. The question is now whether Rep. Omar will sue.
OCC Says 9 Big Banks Took Part In 'Inappropriate' Debanking Practices
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has released a report saying that the nine largest lenders in the U.S. made “inappropriate distinctions” that it used to restrict services among certain customers.
Following the signing of an executive order by President Donald Trump in August of this year, the OCC began reviewing all banks for any current or past practices that effectively barred customers on the basis of political or religious belief.
Wednesday, the OCC released its report, saying that it had found conclusive proof that nine large banks had policies that either refused services to some industries or required higher levels of scrutiny that exceeded the actual financial risks between 2020 and 2023.
According to Bloomberg, the banks involved are accused of restricting access to firms in numerous sectors, including oil and gas exploration, coal mining, firearms, private prisons, payday lending, tobacco and e-cigarette manufacturers, adult entertainment, political action committees and digital assets.
The OCC said that many of the banks had publicly disclosed their policies, which were often tied to environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals.
Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould said in a statement:
“It is unfortunate that the nation’s largest banks thought these harmful debanking policies were an appropriate use of their government-granted charter and market power. While many of these policies were undertaken in plain sight and even announced publicly, certain banks have continued to insist that they did not engage in debanking.”
The Bank Policy Institute, which advocates for many of the lenders named in the OCC report, issued a statement saying, “It’s in banks’ best interest to take deposits, lend to and support as many consumers and businesses as possible to drive economic growth. The industry supports fair access to banking and is already working together with Congress and the administration to ensure banks are able to serve law-abiding customers.”
Earlier in the week, JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon was dismissive of concerns about debanking, telling Fox News that the issue was mostly made up and that the people concerned about it needed to “grow up”
The OCC continues to investigate the matter and says it will hold the banks “accountable,” including the possibility of referrals to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Illegal Miners Are Digging Gold at a $4.8 Billion Newmont Site in Peru
A multi-billion-dollar gold project owned by the world’s biggest bullion producer has been invaded by illegal diggers in northern Peru, according to a top government official.
Newmont Corp.’s stalled Minas Conga project in the Cajamarca region “is being partially exploited by illegal mining,” Prime Minister Ernesto Alvarez told reporters Friday. Newmont didn’t immediately comment.
Oracle Bonds Trade Like Junk as Spreads Widen, Debt Risk Flares
Oracle Corp.’s new investment-grade notes are now trading more like junk bonds, as delays on the completion dates for some data centers add to fears about profits from its artificial intelligence investments.
Extending declines after quarterly earnings earlier this week, paper losses for investors that bought the $18 billion of high-grade notes that Oracle sold in September now totals about $1.35 billion, according to Bloomberg News analysis. The bonds were issued as the company ramps up spending on AI projects.
Elite NYC school gets untraceable bomb threats ‘almost every day’, panicked parents want answers
A highly competitive Brooklyn high school has been plagued with untraceable bomb threats “almost every single day” for months — leaving students and parents terrified, The Post has learned.
The NYPD has not been able to track down the sicko or sickos who have been targeting the Brooklyn Latin School since at least May, and some fearful families said they’re considering ditching the sprawling campus for safer options.
“I feel like it’s happening a lot and they’re not really telling us what’s going on,” one freshman said of the school administration during dismissal on Thursday.
“I am slightly nervous because we don’t have the information to know what’s going on. They kind of protect us by not letting us know,” she told The Post.
The student said she and her classmates at Brooklyn Latin — one of the city’s eight elite specialized public high schools — have been dealing with what feels like near-constant alarms ringing through the halls, making them nervous.
The alarms are followed by “shelter-ins,” where the building goes into lockdown, with kids forced to remain inside, until classes are eventually allowed to resume. Other times, the school is instead placed on “hold,” where kids don’t leave their classrooms, students said.
Cops said none of the threats have been deemed credible, and that the investigation is ongoing.
The disturbing situation was revealed this week by frustrated mom Gillian Telling, who wrote in a People article that there was “no end in sight” to parents’ distress.
All the calls have apparently been directed at Brooklyn Latin, two other schools — Lyons Community School and Williamsburg High School of Arts + Technology — share the same Graham Avenue campus and are subjected to the same evacuations and fear.
“I am afraid to send my children to school because we don’t know exactly what’s happening,” said Manuel Aruz, 62, whose 16- and 14-year-old girls attend the WHSAT.
“When you see the police every week, you know something is wrong and we don’t know exactly what it is,” Aruz told The Post.
Parents initially thought the threats were coming from kids looking to wriggle out of tests last spring — until the calls began surging this school year, after Labor Day in September.
The NYPD has so far not been unable to trace the source because the calls are being made through a VPN, or virtual private network, which masks IP addresses and encrypts a user’s data, Telling wrote.
“The NYPD has seen a sharp increase in swatting threats targeting schools over the last two years — namely false bomb threats being called into schools in order to provoke a police response,” a police department spokesperson said in a statement.
“This practice is disruptive, illegal, and diverts necessary public safety resources from where they are needed.”
The NYPD said that staff from the local precinct and School Safety agents “have continued to work closely with school officials regarding this investigation” and that “additional police personnel continue to conduct patrols in and around the school.”
But the boost in police presence hasn’t helped to put all families at ease, with multiple students saying the threats remain unsettling and distracting.
“I feel nervous knowing that there is a possible threat. It’s almost every single day that we get a bomb threat,” one 10th grader said.
“I feel like — even though it’s just a prank — it’s still possible threatening,” the student said, adding that authorities are “vague” about details.
“Everyone is saying it’s a joke, but it’s really a serious thing.”
One math teacher, who declined to share his name, expressed frustration with the police’s inability to stop the harassment.
“This is not an isolated situation where somebody calls something in and they have to identify whether it’s real or fake and ultimately find out who called it in,” the teacher said. “If they can track down Luigi Mangione in a McDonald’s in Pennsylvania, they can find the person that’s making these calls.”
A WHSAT parent, who gave his name at Richardo, said he hoped the schools might reconsider the state-mandated cellphone ban in light of the threats.
“New York is not a safe place anymore. It’s like a gamble – you bring your kids to school. You expect to get them back the same way you bring them in,” he said.
“What happens if something is happening and they can’t get in contact with us?” he added. “I only got one out of two or three alerts. I want to know right away so I can come and pick them up. I would want to come and get my kids out of there.”
One student, Jacky, 14, said she’s grown used to the bomb threats as just another part of her day.
“I was fearful at first, the first few times, because I was really concerned about how common it was but now I just realized that it’s really nothing,” she said. “They haven’t found anything so I don’t think it’s gonna be serious. I just move on with my day.”
A spokesperson for the city Department of Education said: “The safety of our students and staff is our very top priority. We take every threat extremely seriously, including working directly with our local law enforcement partners, to keep every person in our community safe.”
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