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Daily Caller

World’s Largest State Sponsor Of Terrorism Sets Sights On New Goal: Become A Vacation Destination

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4 minute read

From the Daily Caller News Foundation 

 

By Jake Smith

The world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism, Iran, is setting its sights on a new goal: to become a first-rate resort and tourism destination.

Iran is sanctioned by vast swaths of the international community for its support and funding of various terrorist networks in the Middle East that have killed a number of U.S. forces in recent years. Though the Islamic regime is infamous for imposing an iron rule against the Iranian people and has one of the world’s worst economies, Tehran is hoping to break into the vacation game and bring in millions of tourists per year, according to reports.

“Tourism is the greatest asset for Iran’s cultural diplomacy,” Iranian Minister of Cultural Heritage, Tourism and Handicrafts Seyyed Reza Salehi-Amiri said at an event Tuesday. “Cultural diplomacy fosters relations between nations, shared understanding, and collective peace and stability.”

“We must recognize that cultural heritage and tourism should become one of the country’s top three priorities. By promoting cultural diplomacy, we can aim for a future where tourism replaces the oil revenues as a primary economic driver,” Salehi-Amiri said.

Salehi-Amiri explained that the goal is to attract 15 million tourists to Iran by 2028. He also went on to say that Iran should build hundreds of new hotels by that year.

Iran enjoyed a 21% increase in tourism in 2023, according to the Tehran Times.

“Cultural heritage is Iran’s soft power. Just as we need hard power for deterrence, we need soft power to showcase our cultural and civilizational capacities to the world,” Salehi-Amiri said on Tuesday.

His comments leave many open questions in place, such as how practical it is to build hundreds of new hotels in such a short time frame, as Iran’s annual gross domestic product (GDP) is only a fraction of other Arab states in the region, such as Saudi Arabia the United Arab Emirates. Iran’s economy is considered “repressed,” given rampant corruption in the government, weak rule of law and a lack of robust trade relations with virtually any Western nation, according to The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom.

There are also questions as to how the theoretical tourists would be treated, given Iran’s incredible hostility toward the West and scores of reports of human rights abuses, particularly against women. Because of corruption at even the highest ends of Iran’s government and law enforcement structure, these abuses often go unpunished.

The regime in Iran also sends a considerable amount of money to its various terrorist groups in the Middle East, including Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthis. Iran’s chief export — oil — brings in money for the regime to send to its actors in the region.

Iranian oil revenues fell sharply under the former Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” sanctions campaign against Iran. However, in recent years under the Biden-Harris administration’s foreign policy and eased sanctions, Iran has made tens of billions in additional revenues.

Business

‘Time To Make The Patient Better’: JD Vance Says ‘Big Transition’ Coming To American Economic Policy

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JD Vance on “Rob Schmitt Tonight” discussing tariff results

 

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Hailey Gomez

Vice President JD Vance said Thursday on Newsmax that he believes Americans will “reap the benefits” of the economy as the Trump administration makes a “big transition” on tariffs.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1,679.39 points on Thursday, just a day after President Donald Trump announced reciprocal tariffs against nations charging imports from the U.S. On “Rob Schmitt Tonight,” Schmitt asked Vance about the stock market hit, asking how the White House felt about the “Liberation Day” move.

“We’re feeling good. Look, I frankly thought in some ways it could be worse in the markets, because this is a big transition. You saw what the President said earlier today. It’s like a patient who was very sick,” Vance said. “We did the operation, and now it’s time to make the patient better. That’s exactly what we’re doing. We have to remember that for 40 years, we’ve been doing this for 40 years.”

“American economic policy has rewarded people who ship jobs overseas. It’s taxed our workers. It’s made our supply chains more brittle, and it’s made our country less prosperous, less free and less secure,” Vance added.

Vance recalled that one of his children had been sick and needed antibiotics that were not made in the United States. The Vice President called it a “ridiculous thing” that some medicines invented in the country are no longer manufactured domestically.

“That’s fundamentally what this is about. The national security of manufacturing and making the things that we need, from steel to pharmaceuticals, antibiotics, and so forth, but also the good jobs that come along when you have economic policies that reward investing in America, rather than investing in foreign countries,” Vance said.

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With a baseline 10% tariff placed on an estimated 60 countries, higher tariffs were applied to nations like China and Israel. For example, China, which has a 67% tariff on U.S. goods, will now face a 34% tariff from the U.S., while Israel, which has a 33% tariff, will face a 17% U.S. tariff.

“One bad day in the stock market, compared to what President Trump said earlier today, and I think he’s right about this. We’re going to have a booming stock market for a long time because we’re reinvesting in the United States of America. More importantly than that, of course, the people in Wall Street have done well,” Vance said.

“We want them to do well. But we care the most about American workers and about American small businesses, and they’re the ones who are really going to benefit from these policies,” Vance said.

The number of factories in the U.S., Vance said, has declined, adding that “millions of workers” have lost their jobs.

“My town [Middletown, Ohio], where you had 10,000 great American steel workers, and my town was one of the lucky ones, now probably has 1,500 steel workers in that factory because you had economic policies that rewarded shipping our jobs to China instead of investing in American workers,” Vance said. “President Trump ran on changing it. He promised he would change it, and now he has. I think Americans are going to reap the benefits.”

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2025 Federal Election

‘I’m Cautiously Optimistic’: Doug Ford Strongly Recommends Canada ‘Not To Retaliate’ Against Trump’s Tariffs

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Jason Cohen

Ontario Premier Doug Ford urged Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney to avoid retaliation against the tariffs President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday.

Trump announced in the White House Rose Garden that he would impose “a minimum baseline tariff of 10%” on all goods entering the United States, with Canada not being included on the list of countries with higher rates. When asked about what Canada’s response would be on “Bloomberg: Balance of Power,” Ford said he was “cautiously optimistic” about Canada’s omission from the higher-tier tariffs and emphasized the importance of a cooperative relationship with the U.S.

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“Well, let’s see where these tariffs go. I’m cautiously optimistic that I never saw Canada or Mexico on that list. And it just goes to show you two great countries working together, collaborating together and building relationships,” Ford said. “So again, I’m cautiously optimistic. I think if that’s the case, it’s the right thing for both the U.S and Canada.”

Host Kailey Leinz noted that there are currently tariffs on Canada in place as well as an exemption for goods that are in compliance with the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).

“Does that mean, sir, at least in your mind, that it wouldn’t be appropriate for Canada to retaliate for this at this time?” Leinz asked.

“That is correct. If that’s the case, then I would highly recommend to the prime minister not to retaliate. And let’s carry on a strong relationship,” Ford answered. “Let’s build the American-Canadian fortress around both countries and be the wealthiest, most prosperous, safest two countries in the world.”

Trump declared a national emergency to levy a slew of reciprocal tariffs on what he has deemed “Liberation Day.”

“My fellow Americans, this is Liberation Day, April 2, 2025, will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn, the day America’s destiny was reclaimed, and the day that we began to make America wealthy again,” Trump said.

The president also announced that he would proceed with implementing a 25% tariff on “all foreign-made automobiles” that will take effect at midnight.

Ford in March had imposed a 25% surcharge on electricity to New York, Michigan and Minnesota, but promptly rescinded the policy and apologized to Americans on WABC’s “Cats & Cosby” radio show the following day. The tariffs were a retaliatory measure against Trump’s flurry of tariffs against Canada since starting his second term.

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