I want to thank and congratulate the 12 members of WH 912 (3 of which are also LARC Members & 4 of which are Members of Polk REC) who came to the annual FL Congressional Delegation forum open to the public on October 7, 2019 at the Polk State Campus in the PCSO complex.
Seven made 3 minute testimonies on the unconstitutional provisions of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas HS Public Safety Act (hereafter referred to as SB 7026) and five more supported us for a total of 12 activists in attendance.
Many thanks and kudos to our lineup of speakers – in order of appearance they were Patti Zelsman, Jack Zelsman, Danny Krueger (nominated for this years WH 912 Oscar), Royal Brown III, Glynnda White, Kay Mijou, and Manny Brito. All were well rehearsed and completed their presentations within 3 min limit or a few lines (seconds) past 3 minutes. We also appreciated those present to support us – Roy and Nancy Pearce, Linda Adams, Jane Thomas, and Dy Soldwedel-Krueger.
We spoke before five of the six members of the Polk County Congressional Delegation who were Senators Albritton and Lee and Representatives Burton, Tomkow and Bell. Sen. Stargel was not present, Her Legislative Asst. Chad Davis was the recorder for the Delegation.
Glynnda White wrote the narratives for each of our 7 speakers and submitted them to Chad Davis in advance so that we would be pre-scheduled in a sequence that built upon each other and reinforced all the major points we wanted to get across. Among important points made were as follows:
MSDHSPSA (SB 7026) is unconstitutional and violates our 2nd, 5th and 14th Amendment Rights and, in certain circumstances may also violate our 1st and 5th Amendment Rights – each of the testimonies drove this point home with specific examples of how our rights are/can be violated.
School Safety and Gun Control should have been considered in two separate bills/laws and not cobbled together in one rushed 3 week time frame after the Parkland shootings.
The Risk Protection Order (RPO) codified within SB 7026 prescribes Ex Parte petitions resulting in seizures of firearms, ammo, accessories & permit without a Hearing which comes 14 days later at which time the respondent must prove he/she is not a threat. This is a clear violation of Due Process Rights and the Legal Precedent of “Innocent Until Proven Guilty” for law abiding citizens who might be served with an RPO. This and other provisions are not only troubling to law abiding gun owners (especially those who have undergone background checks, have no criminal record, received CCW training and issued carry permits) but are fraught with many dangers that can result in violations of our Constitutional Rights (see attachment which was given to all the Congressional Panel Members).
Age restrictions on owning, possessing, purchasing long guns clearly violate the 2A rights of 18-20 year olds.
Bottom line recommendation was to support, co-sponsor Rep Mike Hill’s HB 6003 or sponsor a companion Senate Bill to HB 6003 which will revoke the RPO and 2 A age restrictions. Reconsider a much different and constitutional Bill for potential emergency situations where firearm seizure procedures may be appropriate.
This is the kind of Grassroots effort we must all support if we want to retain our rights and not live in fear of the possibility of an unconstitutional seizure of our firearms, ammo, accessories and permit.
BACKGROUND: Risk Protection Order in SB 7026 Violates Many Rights
Stands Due Process on Its Head – RPO takes away our Due Process Rights under the 5th and 14th Amendments as well as the Fl Constitution Sec 1, Art 9 and infringed upon our 2nd Amendment (2A) rights including FL Constitution Sec 1, Art 8.
Ex parte seizure of firearms, accessories, ammo, permits (if issued), etc. before a hearing for the respondent
Triggered by False Allegations/Weak Investigations – Allows possibility of being triggered by false accusations and possible less than thoroughly investigated information by very busy and often overworked law enforcement.
Reverses legal precedent of being innocent until proven guilty since the respondent must prove they are not a threat rather than the court proving they are in the “after the fact” (post seizure) final RPO hearing.
Premonition Not Fact – Judges making decisions to seize property based on premonition of what might happen in the future – to do so opens very dangerous avenues to ignore our rights – trading rights for safety
Impact on Innocent Respondent – Current procedure could lead to law abiding gun owning citizens being put through the embarrassment of seizure, personal cost to hire an attorney, loss of the means to defend themselves and their families and bureaucratic nightmare of being placed on state & federal criminal data bases and the difficulties of clearing their names.
Civil Procedure Treated Like Criminal Law – Since the RPO is a civil procedure, Why then are respondents served an ex parte and Final RPO automatically reported for inclusion in the state and national criminal data bases ? There are no provisions in the RPO section of the law to help the respondent remove their names from these lists thus setting up another potential bureaucratic nightmare for the respondent. This is another level of punishment for the respondent as a part of the criminal system yet they were served with a civil order.
Weak Rules of Evidence – An RPO based on a premonition should at least be supported with beyond reasonable doubt evidence not the nebulous clear and convincing evidence of a threat as stated in the law.
2A Privilege Not Right– Hearings being held after the fact of seizures has the effect of turning the 2A from a right to a privilege.
Legal Representation – During the final RPO Hearing the court is represented by prosecution/attorney(s) representing Law Enforcement (LE) petitioners whereas the respondent is not entitled to Public Defense. If they want (and probably should retain) legal representation, the respondent must hire an attorney without reimbursement compensation should their case be vacated.
Vague language of the RPO is open to varying interpretations by different legal jurisdictions, Judges, LE.
Duty Judges – Reliable sources have reported where large numbers of RPOs are being issued, the load is too great for assigned judges to review petitions and hold hearings so case assignment can go to duty judges with little knowledge of the RPO procedures.
Contract Lawyers for LE are being hired to represent LE petitioners with an incentive for pay based on cases leading to issuing of Final RPOs.
Judges Removed – In at least one Court Jurisdiction, the Judge assigned to RPO cases was replaced by the Chief Judge of that Jurisdiction because of complaints by LE petitioners that he was turning down too many LE petitions he judged to not be clear and convincing and did not issue an ex parte RPO.
Property Treatment – There are no specifics in the RPO process as to the condition of how the seized property of the respondent is to be handled, stored, maintained and returned nor are there stipulations within what timeframe to return property should the ex parte RPO or final RPO be overturned or vacated. This can lead to damaged property being returned without compensation and bureaucratic delays in returning properties.
3rd Party Transfer – The time frame of the option whereby a respondent can transfer property to be held by a 3rd party is also not determined nor prescribed. There are unanswered questions about the strict conditions (such as passing a background check) required of the 3rd party transferee.
For example if the 3d party is a CCW permit holder is this enough proof that a background check has been performed or does a new check have to be made and by whom? Transfer requires a sworn statement that the 3rd party will not allow respondent access during RPO period – will the LE officer serving petition take this statement or does the 3rd party or if not who/where do they go?
Based on the lack of specifics on the transfer process, it appears this transfer won’t happen before the seizure but afterwards/post seizure. This then leads to more bureaucracy and time delays. The transfer should be conducted before seizure so as to preempt the need for LE to take possession, store, maintain and return property e.g. this function should take place between respondent & 3rd party at the same time the petition is served to the respondent and LE conducts inventory. This would save LE resources as well.
Unequal Penalties – The fact that an accuser found to have rendered a false statement can only be charged with a misdemeanor whereas a search warrant can be issued to determine if any of the prohibited items are in the respondent’s residence and if the respondent is found to possess any firearm or related item after the final RPO (including one firearm bullet), they can be charged with a 3rd Degree Felony. This is also absurd, amounts to a civil search and unbalances the scales of justice.
Other Rights in Jeapordy – We are concerned these violations of our 2nd, 5th and 14th Amendment rights by SB 7026 could lead to other violations such as our 1st and 4th Amendment rights.
1st Amendment Rights – Sen. Galvano’s coordination with FDLE to identify hate groups and hate speech could lead to RPOs being issued to members of these groups even though no such correlation exists in past mass shootings.
What will be the criteria/sources used to determine that a group is a terrorist group and that they are a threat? Surely not the uber leftist SPLC who has placed most conservative groups on their list of terrorists?
Who will determine what is hate speech ? This is fraught with the possibility of politicizing hate speech and using it against political opponents and seems more like the tactics of the Communist KGB or Nazi Gestapo than USA law.
There are leftist groups such as the SPLC who have falsely classified most conservative groups as hate groups. Others have now stated the NRA is a terorist group and all members of the NRA are racists. These types of action like the RPO run the risk of turning certain agencies of the FL Govt into “speech police” which could further jeopardize our 1st and 2nd Amendment rights.
Weakening Self Defense Laws: Then there are the intended or unintended consequences in RPOs weakening our Self Defense laws and Stand Your Ground rights – law abiding citizens will be concerned about using their firearms under lawful conditions for fear of then having an RPO issued against them while a determination of immunity from prosecution for shooting takes place.
Acceptance of large donations from gun control groups like Everytown USA to PACs helping Republican Senators get re-elected also smacks of a conflict of interest and definitely conflicts with Republican values.
Civil Law Process Treated Like Criminal Law. Why then are respondents served an ex parte and Final RPO automatically reported for inclusion in the state and national criminal data bases ? There are no provisions in the RPO section of the law to help the respondent remove their names from these lists thus setting up another potential bureaucratic nightmare for the respondent. This is another level of punishment for the respondent as a part of the criminal system yet they were served with a civil order.
Conclusions – All of the above stacks the deck against the respondent in an RPO case especially if the respondent has no prior criminal record, is law abiding and is the target of someone’s vendetta, anger, political attack or other such lies and distortions to make LE petitioner and Judge wary that they might be a threat and then err on the side of perceived safety rather than individual liberty.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Royal A. Brown IIIhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngRoyal A. Brown III2019-10-08 05:58:112019-10-08 06:10:33Citizens Speak Out Against Florida’s ‘Red Flag Law’ and ‘Risk Protection Orders’
Ryan Young, Senior Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI). His writing has appeared in USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Politico, The Hill, Investor’s Business Daily, Forbes, Fortune, and dozens of other publications. He is a frequent guest on radio programs, been interviewed by outlets including The Huffington Post and Voice of America, and been cited in media outlets including ABC News, CNN, and London’s City AM. He formerly hosted the CEI Podcast, and writes the popular “This Week in Ridiculous Regulations” series for CEI’s staff blog.
TOPIC: Minimum Wage Has Trade-offs
George Parry Contributor to The American Spectator, The Federalist, and the Philadelphia Inquirer. George is a former federal and state prosecutor. George served as: Special Attorney for the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section, U.S. Department of Justice 1972-1978; Unit Chief, Investigations Division, Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office 1978-1983; Special Organized Crime Prosecutor, Blair and Cambria counties (central Pennsylvania) 1983-1992; Legal Analyst, KYW-TV 1988-1998; George now has a private trial practice in Philadelphia.
TOPIC: CrowdStrike and the Impeachment Frenzy
Robert Romano, Vice President of Public Policy at Americans for Limited Government. He grew up in a suburban Long Island township, Rocky Point, where he graduated from high school. He studied and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Stony Brook University with the Class of 2008. In his free time, he composes music on piano, paints oil on canvas, and writes fiction. TOPIC China Tariffs.
TOPIC: Ukraine reopened the Burisma-Biden probe in 2018
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Conservative Commandos Radio Showhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngConservative Commandos Radio Show2019-10-08 05:37:462019-10-08 05:37:46PODCAST: CrowdStrike and the Impeachment Frenzy, Ukraine reopened the Burisma-Biden probe in 2018, Minimum Wage Has Trade-offs . . .
This interview, which is lightly edited, originally aired on “Problematic Women.”
Lauren Evans: Welcome back. Virginia and I are in the studio today with religious liberty superstar Emilie Kao. Emilie is an attorney and director of the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society at The Heritage Foundation and has spent the past 14 years fighting for religious liberty. Welcome to the show, Emilie.
Emilie Kao: Thank you, Lauren.
Evans: There’s a case that will be heard by the Supreme Court where a man who identifies as a woman is alleging sex discrimination after being fired from their job at a funeral home. Can you tell us more about this case, Emilie?
Kao: Yes. The Harris Funeral Homes case originated when a male employee of a funeral home wanted to start presenting as a woman. He wanted to start dressing as a woman, and the funeral home has a sex-specific dress code, which is legal.
The funeral home owner, Thomas Rost, was very concerned, not only about his employees, his female employees, who might have to share bathrooms with the male employee, but also about the effect on the people whom the funeral homes serve. Because these are people who are grieving at a time when they’re very focused on their emotional loss, and it could be very distracting and even disturbing for them to see a man dressed as a woman.
So when the employee refused to comply with the dress code according to his sex, they decided to part ways with him and offered him a severance package.
What happened next was that the employee and the EEOC, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, got involved and sued the funeral home. And the case has percolated up through the courts. They lost in the lower court and now it’s gotten to the Supreme Court.
Virginia Allen: Emilie, I want to ask you just to provide a definition for sexual discrimination.
Kao: The correct way to understand discrimination on the basis of sex—it is when one person is treated more disfavorably than a person of the other category.
So if you have a person who is male who is treated worse than a person who’s female because of their sex, that is sex discrimination. If you have a female who is treated worse than a male, that is sex discrimination.
Sex discrimination is not merely when you treat two people differently because we treat males and females differently all the time. That’s why we have some of the other sex-segregated spaces and events that we’ve talked about before. That’s why we have sex-segregated bathrooms. We have sex-segregated sports. Because the courts and the American people have realized men and women are different, and so there’s nothing discriminatory about having sex segregation in appropriate ways, sex-segregated spaces, sex-segregated events that involve a person’s physical capacity.
But what the people in the Harris Funeral Homes case are arguing on behalf of the employee who is identifying as transgender is that he was treated more poorly because of his status as a person who identifies as transgender.
He’s a male who wants to dress as a female. He’s a male who wants to use female restrooms. But that is not sex discrimination because the funeral home would have treated somebody of the opposite sex the same way if they manifested in the same way that this employee is.
So if you were a female employee of that funeral home and you wanted to identify as a male and use the male restroom and wear the male clothing that’s required by the dress code and be referred to as a male, the treatment would be the same of that female employee. So that’s why this case does not actually qualify for the sex discrimination category.
Evans: What was crazy to me about this case is that no laws were technically broken, correct?
Kao: Well, the claim of the EEOC and the employee is that the funeral home owner has violated the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex.
The whole theory of the transgender-identifying employee is that sex actually means gender identity, which there’s nothing in the text that says gender identity. But they have a theory that sex should mean gender identity.
So they’re essentially saying that the EEOC can redefine sex, and they now want the Supreme Court to redefine sex. And the Supreme Court should stay in its own lane, which is to interpret the law, not make the law, which is Congress’ duty.
Allen: So, Emilie, this case is going to come before the Supreme Court on Oct. 8, where it will decide, hopefully, whether federal civil rights law that bars job discrimination on the basis of sex protects transgender people. What do you think we can expect?
Kao: I think you can expect from the funeral home side that they will say Congress should stick with the original public meaning of what the word sex meant in 1964. And that is it established a way of interpreting the law that the court should refer to the original public meeting, which means, what did a regular person in the general public understand sex to mean, not what did a particular member of Congress think?
I think everyone pretty much agrees that in 1964, the word sex meant biological sex, male or female, not a person’s subjective self-perception of their gender, which is what gender identity means.
So I think that there will be a lot of discussion about the procedural part, which is, what is the correct role of the Congress versus what is the correct role of the courts?
As your listeners may know, the Congress has actually been trying to amend the Civil Rights Act recently through the Equality Act to add the classes of sexual orientation and gender identity. So the fact that the Equality Act is being introduced in Congress sort of begs the question, “Well, if sex already meant gender identity, why would you have to add it through this legislation?”
We also know that through the decades, Congress has actually dealt with the question of gender identity. Sometimes they have added it to legislation like the Violence Against Women Act, but sometimes they have declined, they have projected the addition of the term gender identity. So the historical record’s pretty clear. Congress knows that gender identity and sex are two different things.
Allen: So if SCOTUS rules that gender identity does not apply to federal civil rights law, will that create a roadblock for Congress to move forward with the passage of the Equality Act?
Kao: I think it will clarify what the current understanding of the Civil Rights Act should be, and I think it will make it more difficult for the EEOC to continue to politicize these cases. But I don’t think it will make it more difficult in a procedural sense for Congress to try and pass something like the Equality Act.
However, I do think it could make the public support for something like the Equality Act change. Because I think one of the interesting things about this case is that it will bring to the forefront some of the issues that we’ve talked about, how gender identity essentially erases women as a coherent category in the law.
We’ve seen the manifestation of this in several cases like the homeless shelter in Alaska. They were sued because they would not allow a man into a space that was reserved for women who’d been battered, and abused, and trafficked. The whole theory behind the male plaintiff’s case was that he was being discriminated against on the basis of gender identity.
So we see from that case that when you introduce the idea of gender identity, it erases the protections in the law for women, for their safety, and privacy. And there are a number of other cases with women’s sports and with, unfortunately, a girl in a public school in Georgia being sexually assaulted after the school adopted a transgender bathroom policy.
Allen: Emilie, I’m glad that you brought up the Alaska case about the homeless shelter. I want to get into that for a moment. Let me just give a little bit of background to our listeners if they’re not familiar.
The Hope Center is a Christian nonprofit women’s homeless shelter in Anchorage, Alaska. Right now, we have some great news that we just received this week that they are now free to continue serving homeless women without the threat of looming legal action or even being shut down.
The reason why that threat arose to them was in January 2018, a drunk and injured man dressed in a pink nightgown tried to gain access to the Hope Center. During the day, the center does serve men and women by providing them with meals, laundry, and shower services, job skills training, and clothing. But in order to provide a safe space for homeless women, the shelter at night does only house women.
So when this intoxicated, biological man identifying as a woman came knocking on the center’s door after hours, the Hope Center sent the individual to the hospital to get the care he needed. They even paid for the taxi. But then the Hope Center faced a complaint from the Anchorage Equal Rights Commission claiming that the center had discriminated against this individual because of his gender identity. This appeared to be an attempt to attack the center’s Christian beliefs.
At that point, the Christian nonprofit legal defense firm Alliance Defending Freedom stepped in to help and they filed a lawsuit in federal court on the center’s behalf. In August, that court issued an order that temporarily stopped the city from misplaying this law against the Hope Center.
So, Emilie, I want to ask you, how big of a win is this, and do you think this is actually the end of this case or will there be maybe an appeal?
Kao: I think it’s a very big win, not only for the Hope Center but for similarly situated women’s shelters and other spaces for women around the country. I think it’s a great precedent. My understanding is that there was a settlement. So if there was a settlement, I don’t expect that this will be relitigated.
Evans: One thing that I’ve learned since this case has come out is that Anchorage actually has a higher than normal population of women who have been sex trafficked because it’s kind of a middle point between Russia and the United States. So … these women, they need a safe space.
How unique is this case, and are faith-based women’s homeless shelters under attack pretty much everywhere?
Kao: Unfortunately, this is not a totally unique case because we’ve also seen a case in California called Poverello House, I believe it is a secular women’s shelter, where the women were forced to shower with a man who was apparently making, they allege, lewd comments toward them in the showers.
It was actually the women in that case who sued because they did not want to be housed with a man and have to share intimate facilities with a man.
So I think that, unfortunately, wherever we see these laws that have sexual orientation and gender identity in addition to the other protected categories, there is the possibility that women’s safety and privacy will be compromised in spaces that used to be for their protection.
Evans: The name of the act is the Equality Act, and it puts, I think, our listeners and people who believe in religious liberty in a hard place when somebody is like, “Man, why aren’t you for equality?”
So what is kind of misunderstood about this case, and what are some talking points that our listeners can use when put in this hard place of wanting to love all people but wanting to protect women?
Kao: I think the term equality has been misused. I think that one basic thing you can say is that all people have dignity and deserve to be treated with respect. All people have equal status, but not all ideas have equal status. And we don’t have to agree on all ideas.
What the Equality Act would do is basically adopt a government orthodoxy on sexual orientation and gender identity. Now, those two categories are distinct from many of the other categories that are protected in the Civil Rights Act. So if you think of race and sex, those are both biological and immutable traits. Gender identity is a person’s subjective perception of their own sex, which people have the freedom to believe that, but people also should have the freedom to disagree with that, to say, “Well, I think you actually are either a male or a female,” and they don’t believe in gender fluidity.
Then, the category of sexual orientation, again, that also involves a person’s behavior or their conduct, which we are free to have different opinions about behavior and conduct. That is not an immutable characteristic. So, unfortunately, what the Equality Act would do is it would lead to a government orthodoxy, and that will lead to the punishment of dissenters.
Some of those dissenters will be people who have religious convictions. Some of those dissenters will be people with moral convictions. And some of those dissenters, as we’ve seen from the women who oppose the Equality Act, their objections are based on science and based on concerns for women’s safety, and privacy, and equality.
So, unfortunately, the Equality Act would establish a nationwide orthodoxy and punish disagreement.
Allen: Emilie, with cases like the Hope Center case, do you see this as the left weaponizing anti-discrimination law and then using that to attack faith-based organizations?
Kao: I think that the treatment of people of faith over the past few years by the left, especially by organizations like the Human Rights Campaign and actually some members of Congress, has been incredibly intolerant.
You look at some of the rhetoric, the way that they describe people like Jack Phillips, the baker from Colorado. In Colorado, some of the government officials compared him to a Nazi and a slave owner. When you look at the targeting of organizations, businesses like his, with boycotts and picketing and not only that but death threats, harassing phone calls.
That’s, unfortunately, not an isolated incident. We’ve seen that with many of the wedding vendor cases, many of the cases involving sexual orientation and gender identity. There’s been verbal harassment, and economic threats, boycotts, and also sometimes threats of physical violence.
So, unfortunately, I think our culture is at a point right now that the left’s intolerance of religious beliefs about sexuality, and marriage, and even sex differences is increasing. So the use of these laws to punish people for disagreement, I think, is part of an overall picture of increasing intolerance toward people who simply hold the view that marriage is between a man and a woman and that there are two sexes, male and female.
Evans: Emilie, we talk a lot on the show about the Equality Act and these transgender issues, but at the end of the day, we’re blessed in the United States to have the First Amendment that protects our right to religious liberty. A lot of people in the world don’t have that First Amendment protection, and you [look at] a lot of issues talking about international religious freedom. And I know President Trump made a speech … at the U.N. about international religious freedom.
Can you give our listeners kind of an update about what’s going on around the world with these religious freedom issues?
Kao: President Trump gave a landmark speech and elevated religious freedom at the U.N. General Assembly to a level that it’s never been elevated before, which is very critical because the U.N. tends to downplay the importance of religious freedom even though over 80% of the world’s population lives under serious restrictions of religious freedom. So it really put the U.N. on notice and many of the countries that are the worst violators of religious freedom on notice.
I thought a particularly interesting part of the event that he held was to spotlight the survivors of religious persecution, and some people who were there had family members who are still in prison in places like China and Iran.
So I think that the Trump administration has added at the U.N. General Assembly to the work that it’s been doing for the past few years with the International Religious Freedom Ministerial Summit that Secretary [of State Mike] Pompeo and Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom Sam Brownback have hosted.
They’ve done a great job on building multilateral cooperation. Their summits have brought together government leaders from over 100 countries, and it has fostered more cooperation in places like the Middle East, and Asia, and Europe to combat religious freedom violations.
Allen: Emilie, I want to take just a moment to let you share a little bit about an event that’s happening at The Heritage Foundation next week. Earlier in the show, Lauren and I took some time to talk about the epidemic of child abuse through child pornography. And there is an event that you’re hosting next week at Heritage that addresses this crisis. Could you tell us a little bit more about that?
Kao: Thanks, Virginia. Yes, we are very concerned about this growing epidemic of children being sexualized by adults through culture, and education, and health care. Sometimes, this is actually as a result of government-led initiatives, which means that it is actually the use of taxpayer money.
So we will be looking at issues like pornography and trafficking, also the introduction of comprehensive sexuality education in public schools, the introduction of sexual orientation, gender identity curriculum, the transgender policies, and private facilities like bathrooms and locker rooms, and the increasing politicization of health care for children with gender dysphoria that’s leading to harmful treatments of testosterone and surgeries on children. So we will be bringing together thought leaders from around the country to discuss these issues with one another.
Hopefully, this will be a great way for parents to learn about what they can do. We’ll be introducing the national parent resource guide on the transgender trend, which is a very helpful tool for parents, gives them practical steps that they can take if a transgender policy is being introduced in their school district, ways that they can talk to their school, and it tells them what their rights are.
So we’re really looking forward to bringing together all of these experts from around the country to find solutions to this growing epidemic.
Allen: When is the event taking place, and how can people register?
Kao: The event is Wednesday, Oct. 9 from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. They can watch online, and they can register on the Heritage website. We will have three panels on culture, education, and health care, in that order.
>>> On Wednesday, Oct. 9, The Heritage Foundation and Family Policy Alliance will co-host a Summit on Protecting Children from Sexualization to examine these issues in-depth. The summit also will debut the National Parents Resource Guide on the Transgender Trend. RSVP for the event or watch the livestream here.
We really encourage all parents to tune in at some point to this summit because it will give them an overview of how children are being targeted for sexualization, will give them practical tools to fight back, and it will introduce them to some of the federal and state policies that can help solve some of these problems.
Evans: If you are a podcast person, all Heritage events are turned into podcasts. You can listen to it. It’s almost immediate, usually takes an hour or two for us to get it uploaded. Also, a lot of the participants in the panel will be doing interviews with The Daily Signal, which will run throughout the week and probably into next week.
Allen: Thank you so much, Emilie, for joining us. We really appreciate your time and you sharing your expertise with us.
In the wake of every tragic mass shooting or high-profile incident involving gun violence, we hear the same narrative: To stop these horrible atrocities from happening, we must crack down on gun laws.
But is the answer really to create more laws around gun control, or is this just an opportunity to limit your Constitutional right to bear arms?
The researchers at The Heritage Foundation have put together a guide to help you better understand the 8 Stubborn Facts on Gun Violence in America.
They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00The Daily Signalhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngThe Daily Signal2019-10-08 05:00:372019-10-08 05:18:27What You Need to Know About the Transgender Case at the Supreme Court
In a speech Wednesday evening in Reno, Nevada, presidential contender Joe Biden responded to President Trump’s allegations of corruption by asserting, “I’m not going anywhere!”
Biden is correct, but not in the defiant way he intended. He is indeed going nowhere, as his momentum in the race for the Democrat nomination has stalled while competitor Elizabeth Warren has taken first place.
“Let me make something clear to Trump and his hatchet men and the special interests funding his attacks against me — I’m not going anywhere,” Biden said in his speech. “You’re not going to destroy me. And you’re not going to destroy my family. I don’t care how much money you spend or how dirty the attacks get.”
Biden, who is the actual corrupt politician at the center of Trump’s Ukraine “scandal,” also claimed ludicrously that the President is “afraid of just how badly I would beat him next November.”
In March 2016 – while Ukraine’s Prosecutor General, Viktor Shokin, was actively investigating Burisma’s alleged corruption – Vice President Biden threatened to withhold $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees to the Ukrainian government unless it agreed to fire Shokin immediately. Because the revocation of American aid would have been devastating to Ukraine, President Petro Poroshenko caved to Biden’s threat and fired Shokin on March 29. At the time of Shokin’s termination, he and other Ukrainian prosecutors were in the midst of preparing a request to interview Hunter Biden about his activities and the funds he was receiving from Ukraine.
In a sworn affidavit prepared for a European court, Shokin later testified that he had been told that the reason for his firing was that Joe Biden was troubled by the Burisma investigation. “The truth,” said Shokin, “is that I was forced out because I was leading a wide-ranging corruption probe into Burisma Holdings, a natural gas firm active in Ukraine and Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, was a member of the Board of Directors. On several occasions President Poroshenko asked me to have a look at the case against Burisma and consider the possibility of winding down the investigative actions in respect of this company but I refused to close this investigation.”
And here is how Joe Biden himself – in a January 2018 speech at the Council on Foreign Relations – boastfully recollected his own role in getting Shokin fired:
“I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee. I had gotten a commitment from [Ukrainian President] Poroshenko and from [Prime Minister] Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor [Shokin]. And they didn’t. So they said they had — they were walking out to a press conference. I said, nah, I’m not going to — or, we’re not going to give you the billion dollars. They said, ‘you have no authority. You’re not the president. The president [Obama] said’ — I said, ‘call him’ [Obama]. I said, ‘I’m telling you, you’re not getting the billion dollars.’ I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion. I’m going to be leaving here in,’ I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a bitch. He got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.”
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Discover The Networkshttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDiscover The Networks2019-10-04 04:16:272019-10-04 04:16:35Stalled Biden to Trump: ‘I’m Not Going Anywhere!’
One might almost get the impression that Tlaib wants to sow hatred and division between different groups of Americans. Now what could possibly be the purpose of doing that?
“Tlaib: Use only blacks as Detroit’s facial recognition analysts,” by George Hunter, Detroit News, October 1, 2019 (thanks to Tim):
U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib told Detroit police Chief James Craig he should employ only black people on the department’s facial recognition team because “non-African Americans think African Americans all look the same.”
The Detroit Democrat made the statement during a tour of the Real Time Crime center, where monitors display live footage from video cameras on traffic lights and in and around businesses.
A day after Tlaib made the comment Monday, her spokesman said she was trying to convey the importance of accurately identifying black suspects in a city with an African American population of about 80%.
Police officials invited Tlaib to the facility inside Public Safety Headquarters to see how Detroit uses facial recognition software, after she criticized the technology in an Aug. 20 tweet. The congresswoman wrote: “@detroitpolice You should probably rethink this whole facial recognition bull—-.”
The tour, which lasted more than an hour, was often tense, with Tlaib and Craig wrangling over how the department uses the software, privacy issues,and concerns that the technology misidentifies a disproportionate number of darker-skinned people. A major point of contention: whether only black civilians should work in the crime center analyzing photos flagged by the software.
“Analysts need to be African Americans, not people that are not,” Tlaib told Craig. “I think non-African Americans think African Americans all look the same.
“I’ve seen it even on the House floor: People calling Elijah Cummings ‘John Lewis,’ and John Lewis ‘Elijah Cummings,’ and they’re totally different people,” Tlaib said, referring to the two longtime Democratic congressmen. “I see it all the time, and I love them because they go along with it.”
Craig replied: “I trust people who are trained, regardless of race; regardless of gender. It’s about the training.”
“I know,” Tlaib answered. “But it does make a huge difference with the analysts.”
After the tour, when a reporter asked whether she meant white people weren’t qualified to work in the crime center, Tlaib said: “No, I think there has actually been studies out that it’s hard for — African Americans would identify African Americans, or Latinos, same thing.”
Tlaib then was asked whether that means non-whites should be barred from working as crime analysts in mostly white communities. She replied: “Look it up.”…
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Jihad Watchhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngJihad Watch2019-10-04 04:02:062019-10-04 04:12:14Tlaib: Use only blacks as Detroit’s facial recognition analysts, whites “think African Americans all look the same”
The Reverend Bryan Fulwider has been arrested and charged with sexual assault on a minor by a person in a position of authority.
Fulwider is the co-host of Friends Talking Faith with The Three Wise Guys, an independent radio show carried by WMFE since 2012. It is also carried by WMFV.
When reached by WMFE Wednesday night, co-host Imam Muhammad Musri said he was unaware of the charges and arrest of Fulwider, and declined to comment.
His arrest warrant was issued by the Winter Park Police Department, but was not immediately available. Fulwider was arrested Wednesday and booked into the Seminole County Jail, and is due in court Thursday afternoon.
In 2012, a team from The United West exposed the hypocrisy of an interfaith meeting when conservative views are introduced by Egyptian Baptist Pastor Usama Dakdok. What followed was an interesting transition when Bryan Fulwider and Imam Sykes left and a true interfaith meeting followed.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Alan Kornmanhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngAlan Kornman2019-10-03 08:44:502019-10-03 09:02:39VIDEO: Chair of Interfaith Council of Central Florida Rev. Bryan Fulwider arrested for Assault on a Minor
This is an update of a story I posted here in Augustwhere we learned that even the Washington Post was calling out local Leftwing politicians for their hypocrisy!
It is your classic ‘Not-in-my-backyard’ tale.
Washington, D.C. and its wealthy (Democrat-run) bedroom communities of northern Virginia do not want shelters for themostly teens coming across our borders illegally.
Trump administration drops plans for Northern Virginia immigrant shelter
The Trump administration has called off its plans to bring a new shelter for unaccompanied immigrant children to Northern Virginia.
Federal officials are “no longer conducting exploratory assessments of vacant properties to lease” in the region, according to an email from spokespeople with the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement. The agency revealed in August that it was considering a variety of Northern Virginia jurisdictions for a new, 110,000-square-foot facility.
But that move prompted fierce pushback from local leaders…
[….]
The HHS officials did not say why they ultimately declined to pursue a shelter in the region. They added in the email that they’ve also stopped searching for space in Atlanta, Central Florida and Los Angeles, and will likely pursue new facilities in Texas and Arizona instead.
The mayor of Alexandria, Virginia, Justin Wilson, said if the feds send some bucks to the city he might consider discussing it further.
“If the federal government wished to provide the city with the resources to care for these children, in partnership, I would be open to discussing such a scenario,” Wilson wrote. “But as it has been presented to the city at this point, I do not believe this is something the city should be a part of.”
The Trump administration’s plans for a similar immigrant shelter in D.C. are considerably more unsettled.
Separately from the search for space in Northern Virginia, HHS also plans to work with Maryland-based contractor Dynamic Service Solutions to open a new shelter in Takoma. Mayor Muriel Bowser, however, has rolled out new regulations in a bid to block that project, though it remains unclear whether federal officials have a way to sidestep her efforts.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Ann Corcoranhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngAnn Corcoran2019-10-03 07:25:542019-10-03 07:26:27D.C. and Virginia Do NOT Want Federal Shelters for Unaccompanied Alien Children
The Trump administration has urged the Supreme Court to stay out of a long-running copyright dispute between Google and Oracle Corp., dealing a considerable blow to Google’s efforts to avoid an $8 billion damages award.
At issue in the dispute, billed as the copyright fight of the decade, are software interfaces called API declarations, which are shorthand commands that facilitate prewritten, complex computer functions. Google used a trove of Oracle-owned Java API declarations when building its Android smartphone operating system.
“[Google] copied 11,500 lines of computer code verbatim, as well as the complex structure and organization inherent in that code, in order to help its competing commercial product,” the Trump administration’s legal brief reads. “The record demonstrates, moreover, that [Google’s] unauthorized copying harmed the market for [Oracle’s] Java platform.”
Sun Microsystems originally developed the contested API declarations. Oracle acquired Sun in 2010. Shortly thereafter, Oracle sued Google in federal court for patent and copyright infringement, saying Google impermissibly copied the API declarations. Years of litigation followed.
Now before the Supreme Court, Google questions whether APIs are copyrightable in the first place. The federal Copyright Act provides that protection does not extend to “methods of operation.” In Google’s view, APIs are a method of operation because they help developers access prewritten, complex functions.
“The Java API declarations simply tell developers how to access the prewritten methods to perform tasks carried out by the implementing code,” Google’s petition reads. “In that respect, the declarations are analogous to a set of rules developers are trained to follow when writing programs in the Java language. If the rules were changed, the prewritten methods would not work. For that reason, the declarations are necessarily part of the method of operating the libraries of prewritten code.”
The Trump administration disagreed, saying APIs do not count as a method of operation simply because they perform a function.
“Although there is a sense in which all computer code could be described as a method of operating a computer, the Copyright Act as a whole makes clear that computer programs can be protected by copyright, refuting any suggestion that the functional character of computer code suffices to bring it within [the Copyright Act],” the government’s brief reads.
The Supreme Court gives the federal government’s views great credence when, as here, the justices ask for its guidance about whether to take a case.
However, Google contends the federal appeals courts are split as to whether copyright protections reach software interfaces like APIs. The Supreme Court justices are much more likely to take a case featuring a question of law over which multiple courts disagree.
Google prevailed at the case’s first trial in 2012. A jury deadlocked over Oracle’s claims, prompting the judge to sign with Google. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, a specialized court for patent appeals, reversed that decision and ordered a new trial in 2014.
Google appealed the Federal Circuit’s ruling to the Supreme Court, but the justices turned the request down in 2015.
A second trial followed in 2016. A jury sided with Google, finding fair use protected its reliance on the API declarations. The Federal Circuit overturned that verdict, ruling Google had not engaged in fair use. It returned the case to a lower court for a trial on damages.
That decision is now pending before the Supreme Court. On April 29, the justices asked the Trump administration to weigh in on the petition.
Kevin Daley is a legal affairs reporter for the Daily Caller News Foundation. Twitter: @kevindaleydc.
EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, email licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00The Daily Callerhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngThe Daily Caller2019-10-02 05:01:112019-10-02 05:01:11Trump Jilts Google in Copyright Dispute at Supreme Court
I suppose there is nothing unusual about this case. It likely goes on across America on a daily basis, but I thought it might be instructive for a couple of reasons.
First, although the FBI makes it clear that the arrested man is not a US citizen, we are never told (as usual!) how he came to be living in America.
Did he come illegally or did he come as a refugee, a diversity visa lottery winner, or on some other visa for work or school? If law enforcement never tells us that information how can we make a judgement about which legal programs are failing us?
The news is very brief (below), but more interesting and worth a few minutes of your time is the criminal complaint which shows how the feds got this alleged sexual predator, Sanjay Lama (aka Awesome_Jack) talking via phone and internet discussions that were being taped.
From the US Justice Department(at least the feds are telling us the man is not a US citizen right in the headline for a change).
LOL! the headline doesn’t begin with “Jacksonville man.”
Nepalese Citizen Arrested And Charged With Attempting To Entice And Meet A 12-Year-Old Child To Engage In Sexual Activity
Jacksonville, Florida – Sanjay Lama (29, Jacksonville) has been arrested and charged with using the internet to attempt to entice a 12-year-old child to engage in sexual activity. Lama is a citizen of Nepal who is legally residing in Jacksonville. If convicted, he faces a mandatory minimum penalty of 10 years, and up to life, in federal prison and a potential life term of supervised release. Lama has been detained pending a detention hearing scheduled for October 1, 2019.
According to court documents, on September 25, 2019, an undercover FBI agent, who was posing online as a 12-year-old child, was contacted by the user “Awesome_Jack,” who was later identified as Lama. On that day, during an online conversation between Lama and the undercover agent, Lama expressed his desire to meet the “child” to engage in sexual activity. Lama further provided the undercover agent with details about the sexual acts that he wished to perform on the “child.” Later that day, Lama rode his motorcycle to a prearranged location in Jacksonville to meet the “child” and was arrested by FBI agents.
[….]
It is another case brought as part of Project Safe Childhood, a nationwide initiative launched in May 2006 by the Department of Justice to combat the growing epidemic of child sexual exploitation and abuse.
Cases like this should be widely distributed, but it won’t be because once again the PC media isn’t eager to report on immigrant criminal activity. It doesn’t fit the meme that they are all here working hard and seeking a better life.
A wide distribution of news like this might just save some young girls from exploitation as well!
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Ann Corcoranhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngAnn Corcoran2019-10-01 08:59:382019-10-01 09:11:26Jacksonville, FL: Citizen of Nepal Arrested for Soliciting Underage Girl for Sex
When the alarm went off at Jennifer Hrobuchak’s work, the 22-year-old district manager didn’t think twice. She got in her car in the early morning hours and headed off to the store to investigate. The new college graduate, who had hoped to have a career saving people from drugs, never saw the man run through the red light straight at her. At 82 miles per hour, he slammed Jennifer’s car across the road into a building that crushed and killed her. After seven years of telling the story, her mom, Corinne, still gets emotional. And it’s no wonder. The man who hit her was high on marijuana and walked away from the scene completely unharmed. Her daughter never walked anywhere again.
There are thousands of stories like Jennifer’s. Agonized parents like Jeffrey Veatch’s whose son died snorting heroin, only after marijuana experimentation led him there. After the unimaginable pain of losing a child, the idea that anyone would make it easier for kids to get addicted to pot is hard for any of them to fathom. And yet, last Wednesday, in the U.S. House, more than 300 members of Congress put their names behind a bill that would help legitimize a business that’s destroying and endangering lives.
It was the first ever vote on a stand-alone cannabis bill, not that the name would have told you so. The SAFE Banking Act, one of the more ridiculously named pieces of legislation in the Democratic House, would make it easier for marijuana companies to “open checking accounts and get business loans.” Pot companies argue that it would make the entire market safer, since they tend to operate on a “cash-only basis” or pay sky-high fees to the banks who are willing to work with them. Amazingly, 321 members of Congress (including 91 Republicans) fell for this logic, which encourages banks to get involved in the sale of what the federal government still considers an illegal substance.
Luke Dean Niforatos, chief of staff for Smart Approaches to Marijuana, can’t believe that the U.S. House would green-light a bill that would allow billions of dollars to flow into the pot market. Calling it the “Safe Vaping Act,” Niforatos told listeners on “Washington Watch” that this would mean “tons more money for these companies to create more marijuana, vaping oils, more marijuana vapes, which would feed into the crisis that we’re talking about right now today.
“It defies comprehension that the House would pass this,” he argued. “And now it’s in the Senate. And you have a number of senators — [even solid Christians who are]… being swayed by this argument that marijuana industry needs access to these banks. You know, they need to hear from everyone loud and clear that there’s a vaping crisis going on. The last thing we should do is allow money in to this industry that’s putting out these marijuana vapes.”
And while the Democratic House may be embracing pot, the reality, Luke explains, is that the rest of the country is having second thoughts.
“We actually had a dozen states or more reject marijuana legalization this year alone, including New York, New Jersey and Connecticut — all very progressive states with progressive governors who were totally committed to legalizing marijuana. But minority groups and family groups and other groups came out and said, ‘No thanks.’. So there’s a movement now in this country to push against this — and a lot of that is being stemmed by a number of major public health concerns we’re discovering. Maybe not many people know this, but just three weeks ago, the United States surgeon general, Dr. Jerome Adams, just released the first surgeon general’s advisory on marijuana in 40 years.”
There are probably some conservatives out there who’ve fallen for the libertarian lie that the government can do a better job regulating marijuana and protecting people if it’s legal. But the research is clear: all that’s happening in the states where pot is allowed are more arrests, more hospital visits, more suicides, more crime, more DUIs, more work-related problems — more Jennifers.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) isn’t going to be in a hurry to pass anything on the House Democrats’ radical agenda. But the pressure is building on him, even from members in his own party, to chase these dead-end solutions. Contact your senators and ask them to hold the line on the SAFE Banking Act.
Tony Perkins’s Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC senior writers.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Family Research Councilhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngFamily Research Council2019-10-01 07:50:412019-10-01 07:50:41PODCAST: Pot Bill Tokes the Line on Public Safety
August 26, 2019 (Texas Home School Coalition Association) — On November 21, 2013, Texas Child Protective Services (CPS) forcibly removed seven children of a Texas homeschool family, in spite of no evidence of abuse or neglect, by order of Judge Graciela Olvera of the 256th District Court of Dallas County.
The action against the Tutt family calls to mind the saying “No good deed goes unpunished.” The Tutts were a Christian family with five biological children, three adopted children, and one in the process of private adoption. (Three of the biological children are grown and living outside the home.) The Tutts spent several years as a licensed CPS foster home, adopted a child from CPS foster care, and were serving with Safe Families, working with at-risk families and directly with CPS to help children in need of care because of abuse or neglectful situations. At the time of the incident that drew CPS’s attention, they were caring for a sibling group of five, including an autistic child, through Safe Families. Additionally, CPS had independently placed an infant with them, knowing that they already had 11 children in their home. This family obviously had a heart for helping children in bad situations, and CPS itself was aware of this goodwill and called on the family as a resource for such children for many years.
On September 21, 2013, a four-year-old autistic child in the Tutts’ care wandered away from the home after climbing over a baby gate, out a dog door, and over a 5-foot fence. The Tutts’ eight-year-old followed the four-year-old but could not bring him back, so he stayed with the child while the other Tutt children notified their father, Trevor, who immediately got in his car and began to search for them. Unfortunately, Trevor turned right at the end of the block while the children turned left, and a police officer picked the children up and returned them to the home before Mr. Tutt could find them. Without entering the home, but seemingly upset with the number of children there, the fact that the shaded yard did not have grass, and the fact that the autistic child had soiled himself, the officer contacted CPS.
Read more.
Child Protection Services have been overrun by liberals and are now weaponized tools of the left.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Bill Finlayhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngBill Finlay2019-10-01 06:44:562019-10-01 06:55:11VIDEO: Child Protection Services attack Christian families for teaching the gospel
While there was plenty wrong with Wednesday’s House Judiciary Hearing on H.R. 1296, the proposed ban on semi-automatic firearms introduced by Representative David Cicilline (D-R.I.), there were some shining moments for those who still support the Second Amendment.
First, there were the two women who testified in opposition to the latest attempt at banning America’s most popular rifles.
Amy Swearer, the Senior Legal Policy Analyst for the Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, used an effective combination of statistics, research, analytical thinking, and anecdotal evidence in her testimony [below] to point out the massive flaws with enacting a revised version of the failed 1994 Clinton gun ban.
From a statistical standpoint, Amy explained that the firearms targeted by H.R. 1296 are used in a fraction of all firearm-related crime. She explained that Americans are four-times more likely to be stabbed to death than to be killed by a criminal wielding one of these firearms.
And while many in the gun-ban community continually ask why anyone “needs” a semi-automatic rifle, Ms. Swearer pointed out that these so-called “assault weapons” are particularly suited for civilians to use for personal protection, especially at times when the government is “unable or unwilling to defend entire communities from large-scale civil unrest.” Amy stated that in 1982, during the Los Angeles riots, many business owners and private citizens used such firearm to protect their lives and their property from rampant looters when the police were nowhere to be found. Similarly, during the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri in 2014, these firearms were again utilized by law-abiding citizens for lawful, defensive purposes.
Amy drove home her point about the suitability of guns like the AR-15 for personal protection by relating the story of taking her mother, who was not familiar with firearms, to the range to teach her how to safely use a gun. Ms. Swearer related that her mother, like many handling firearms for the first time, had difficulty with using a handgun accurately and effectively. When she switched to an AR-15, however, Amy said her mother was able to control the firearm far more easily than a handgun, and her accuracy improved vastly.
“That is why law-abiding citizens buy millions of these firearms,” Amy said. “When accuracy and stopping power matter, they are simply better.”
Pointing out that firearms are used by law-abiding citizens for personal protection between 500,000 and 2,000,000 times a year, Ms. Swearer closed by hoping politicians do not strip her mother of the ability to use the most effective firearm possible for ending threats to her safety.
Dianna Muller, a retired 22-year police veteran, spoke next [below]. A professional competitive shooter who has represented the United States in competition, Mrs. Muller also works with The DC Project, a nonpartisan educational initiative that seeks to bring 50 women, one from each state, to the nation’s capital to promote gun rights.
Mrs. Muller pointed out that gun rights are women’s rights. She stated that she is particularly vulnerable to violent criminal attack because she is likely smaller and “less equipped for violence” than someone who may seek to do her harm, especially if she is outnumbered. “My firearm is the great equalizer,” Dianna testified, “and levels the playing field.”
Also addressing the question of why someone “needs” an AR-15, she stated hers is her preferred firearm for home defense, and that her husband also uses one for hunting. Mrs. Muller also pointed out that if legislators want to look at reducing firearm-related fatalities, rather than demonizing gun owners, they should look at promoting several programs she mentioned that have already had an impact, and would be more effective than adding restrictions on law-abiding gun owners. Among the programs she highlighted were NRA’s Eddie Eagle and School Shield.
Outnumbered by five anti-gun panelists, and facing a hostile majority in the House Judiciary Committee, Amy Swearer and Dianna Muller did an outstanding job representing the views of those opposed to banning guns.
Several staunch defenders of the Second Amendment who serve on the House Judiciary Committee also exhibited their strong support of law-abiding gun owners.
U.S. Representative Doug Collins (R-Ga.), the ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, reminded people that calling semi-automatic rifles like the AR-15 “assault weapon” is designed to confuse those unfamiliar with firearms. He pointed out that some attribute the creation of the term to anti-gun extremist Josh Sugarmann, the founder and Director the Violence Policy Center. Sugarmann, Collins pointed out, stated, “The weapons’ menacing looks, coupled with the public’s confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons—anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun—can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.”
Collins also pointed out the hypocrisy of those who promote banning guns like the AR-15 in order to allegedly save lives. While those opposed to these firearms keep trying to tie them to an “epidemic of gun violence,” the ranking member pointed out that rifles of ANY kind were used in 403 murders in 2017. Semi-automatic rifles that fall under the restrictions of H.R. 1296 would be only a fraction of those homicides.
By comparison, he pointed out that in 2017, knives were used in 1,591 murders, and hands and feet in 696. The “epidemic” would seem to be far worse in areas unrelated to semi-automatic rifles.
Ranking Member Collins also pointed out that speeding was the stated cause in 9,717 fatalities in 2017, and further pointed out that nobody is seeking to limit automobiles to a maximum top speed of 70 MPH.
During the period when committee members could question the panelists, Collins asked Dianna Muller—who was on the police force before, during, and after the Clinton gun ban—if the ’94 ban had any discernible effect on her as a law enforcement officer. She said it had zero effect.
When Representative Steve Chabot (R-Ohio) had a chance to speak, Amy Swearer related that the official report on the effectiveness of the 1994 gun ban found that renewing it would likely have no measurable effect on violent crime.
When it was time for Representative James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) to speak, he pointed out that the discussion of banning so-called “assault weapons” focused on cosmetic features, rather than how a firearm functions. After stating that hunting with a semi-automatic rifle is legal in most states, he asked the panelists if hunting rifles should be banned. Only Amy Swearer and Dianna Muller stated they should not.
Representative Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) used part of his time to point out that, when President Barrack Obama asked the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to look at existing research on gun violence, they found that “self-defense can be an important crime deterrent,” and that “semi-automatic rifles such as the AR-15 are commonly used in self-defense, especially in the homes of law-abiding citizens because they’re easier to control than handguns.”
It was during Representative Biggs’ questioning that Dianna Muller made what was possibly the most widely reported comment during the hearing. When speaking about the proposed ban on semi-automatics being discussed, Mrs. Muller stated, “I will not comply with the ‘assault weapons’ ban.” Ohio Representative Jim Jordan (R) was the next Second Amendment supporter to speak, and he succinctly summed up what the legislation would ban, stating, “Semi-automatic weapons, with a magazine capacity of ten rounds or more, with scary features….”
During his questioning of Amy Swearer, the two discussed the fact that the “scary features” don’t have any impact on how the firearms function, and would not benefit criminals intent on doing harm. Both seemed to agree that those law-abiding citizens who follow the law will be less able to effectively defend themselves or their loved ones from violent criminals.
In fact, Ms. Swearer expressed concern that, should the bill become law, “You’ll see millions of law-abiding citizens become felons overnight for having scary looking features on firearms.”
As the two discussed the commonly understood fact that criminals try to avoid armed victims, and that the bill would only disarm law-abiding citizens, Rep. Jordan made another simple, but powerful point.
“Bad guys aren’t stupid, they’re just bad,” he said. “They’re just evil. They’re not going to follow the law. What this legislation will do is make it more difficult for law-abiding people like you, like all kinds of folks, to protect themselves when some bad guy is bent on doing something wrong.”
Florida Representative Greg Steube (R) pointed out that those promoting the ban on modern sporting rifles like the AR-15, if successful, will eventually look to banning other guns until they are all banned. He also attempted to ask Charlottesville Police Chief RaShall Brackney to clarify an earlier remark about banning all firearms. Chief Brackney seemed unwilling to either clarify or walk back her earlier statement.
Other Republican committee members also spoke out in defense of the Second Amendment and in opposition to the bill, including Representatives Ken Buck (Colo.), Ben Cline (Va.), Louie Gohmert (Tex.), and Tom McClintock (Cal.).
Our thanks go out to all of those who spoke in support of law-abiding gun owners and our right to keep and bear arms, especially considering they were in a hostile committee where pro-gun panelists were outnumbered 5-2.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00NRA Institute for Legislative Actionhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngNRA Institute for Legislative Action2019-09-30 18:38:552019-10-05 07:12:10VIDEO: Where the House Judiciary Actually Got Things Right
The Justice Department filed a statement of interest in support of the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, which is being sued by a teacher because he was in a same-sex marriage in contradiction with church teaching.
“The First Amendment to the United States Constitution protects the right of religious institutions and people to decide what their beliefs are, to teach their faith, and to associate with others who share their faith,” said Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband for the Civil Rights Division.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, September 27, 2019
Justice Department Files Statement of Interest in Indiana Lawsuit Brought by Former Teacher Against Archdiocese
The Justice Department today filed a Statement of Interest explaining that the First Amendment protects the right of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Indianapolis to interpret and apply Catholic doctrine. The lawsuit was brought against the Archdiocese by a former teacher who was fired from a Catholic high school within the diocese because he was in a same-sex marriage in contradiction to Catholic teaching on marriage. The Archdiocese indicated that the school had to terminate the teacher, or the school would forfeit its Catholic identity, which would have led to several repercussions for the school.
“The First Amendment to the United States Constitution protects the right of religious institutions and people to decide what their beliefs are, to teach their faith, and to associate with others who share their faith,” said Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband for the Civil Rights Division. “The First Amendment rightly protects the free exercise of religion.”
“If the First Amendment’s Religion Clauses stand for anything, it is that secular courts cannot entangle themselves in questions of religious law,” said United States Attorney Josh Minkler.
This case stems from a directive issued by the Archdiocese to Cathedral High School, a Catholic school in Indianapolis. The Archdiocese told Cathedral that the school’s continued employment of a teacher in a public, same-sex marriage in contradiction to Catholic teachings on marriage would result in Cathedral’s forfeiture of its Catholic identity. After much deliberation, the school terminated the teacher. The teacher then filed suit against the Archdiocese, claiming the directive to Cathedral interfered with his employment and his contractual relationship with the school.
The government explains in the Statement of Interest that the First Amendment prevents courts from impairing the constitutional rights of religious institutions. The former teacher’s lawsuit attempts to penalize the Archdiocese for determining that schools within its diocese cannot employ teachers in public, same-sex marriages, and simultaneously identify as Catholic. Supreme Court precedent clearly holds that the First Amendment protects the Archdiocese’s right to this form of expressive association, and courts cannot interfere with that right.
The Statement of Interest also makes clear that courts cannot second-guess how religious institutions interpret and apply their own religious laws. Supreme Court precedent explains that the First Amendment forbids courts from engaging in “quintessentially religious controversies.” Instead, as the Statement of Interest explains, “the legitimacy of the Archdiocese’s decision as a matter of Catholic law” is committed exclusively “to the judgment of the Archdiocese.”
In July 2018, the Department of Justice announced the formation of the Religious Liberty Task Force. The Task Force brings together Department components to coordinate their work on religious liberty litigation and policy, and to implement the Attorney General’s 2017 Religious Liberty Guidance.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Dr. Rich Swierhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDr. Rich Swier2019-09-30 07:02:472019-09-30 07:20:24DOJ Supports Catholic Archdiocese that fired a teacher who is in a same sex marriage
President Trump announced the U.S. will bar Iranian government officials and their relatives from entering the U.S. The announcement came at same time that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was in New York for the UN General Assembly,
“Given that this behavior threatens peace and stability in the Middle East and beyond, I have determined that it is in the interest of the United States to take action to restrict and suspend the entry into the United States, as immigrants or non-immigrants, of senior government officials of Iran, and their immediate family members,” Trump said in the proclamation.
See shocking list below of relatives of senior Iranian government officials who are currently studying or working in the US
A U.S. government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity explained:
“For years, the Iranian regime has attacked, criticized, and aggressively worked against the United States. Meanwhile, hypocritical regime leaders and their family members have been exploiting our freedom and prosperity.
“They come to America to go to our schools, seek jobs, enjoy our entertainment, and take in our culture.”
The official added that such “officials and their families don’t deserve the privilege and luxury of coming to the United States.”
There are currently many children and relatives of Iranian officials who reside in the U.S., having received visas to attend college, work and live in the U.S. This is despite the public hostilities of these individuals towards the U.S.
Some of the more famous relatives of Iranian government officials include:
Fatima Ardeshir-Larijani, daughter of Ali Larijani who is head of the Iranian parliament and former official in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Fatima lives in Ohio and is studying internal medicine at the University Hospital of Cleveland (ranked as one of the U.S.’s leading health care centers).
Ali Fereydoun, whose uncle is Iranian President Hassan Rouhani. Ali Fereydoun is the chief engineer for an unnamed company in New York.
Isa Hashimi, son of Masoumeh Ebtekar (a.k.a. Sister Mary) who is the vice president for women’s affairs in Iran and former spokesperson for the students who held 52 American diplomats and citizens hostage for 444 days after the Iranian Revolution in 1979. Hashimi is a doctoral student in psychology at the University of Chicago.
Ihsan Nobakht and Nilufer Nobakht, son and daughter of Ali Nobakht who is a member of the Iranian parliament (Ihsan and Nilufer’s uncle, Ali Nobakht, is the previous spokesman for the Iranian government). Ihsan is an assistant scholar at the George Washington University and Nilufer is studying at the same university.
Seyed Hossein Mousavian is a visiting research scholar at Princeton University. Mousavian is an Iranian policymaker and scholar who served on Iran’s team during nuclear negotiations with the EU and International Atomic Energy Agency. He previously attended the California State University, Sacramento where he received a degree in engineering.
Although no longer residing in the U.S., Ali Akbar Salehi, current head of the Atomic Energy Association of Iran and former minister of foreign affairs, received a doctorate in nuclear engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1977.
Similarly, Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, previously lived in the U.S. Zarif obtained a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree from San Francisco State University as well as a master’s degree and a doctorate from the University of Denver.
Zarif’s son, Mahdi, studied at the City University of New York.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will have the authority to make the final decisions as to who will be allowed in and who will not. Last February, Pompeo said the administration was looking into the issue of family members of Iranian regime officials living in the U.S.
In a video published on the State Department’s Farsi Twitter account, Pompeo was asked by an Iranian, “Why isn’t the United States doing anything about the family members of the regime officials living in America?”
Pompeo responded at the time, “That’s a very good question. Think about what you just asked. You have the very people who are destroying the way of life for ordinary people all across Iran, sending their kids (abroad), because they’re very wealthy, because they have stolen from you, they have taken your money corruptly, in a way that has harmed good hardworking people of Iran.”
Pompeo also said, “This issue that they [Iranian government officials] send their family members abroad bothers us too.”
The new proclamation by the president will not apply to lawful U.S. permanent residents, those granted asylum or refugees already admitted to the United States.
This latest action is part of Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign against the Islamic Republic, the largest state sponsor of terrorism in the world.
In other news, Houthi leaders in Yemen said they covered for Iran by taking responsibility for the recent attack on the Saudi national oil company Aramco (which supplies five percent of the world’s oil supply), according to a report in The Wall Street Journal which quoted Saudi officials.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Clarion Projecthttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngClarion Project2019-09-27 06:30:532019-09-27 06:31:09Trump Bars Iranian Gov’t Officials and Relatives From U.S.
President Trump, with his foreign policy and national security team, held a presser after his three days at the 74th Session of the United Nations General Assembly. The President also took questions at the end.
Listen to the good news. News that won’t be reported by the media.
During the Q&A President Trump addresses both Biden and his conversation with the President of Ukraine stating that both countries are concerned about corruption at the highest levels of government.
Remarks by President Trump in Press Conference
InterContinental New York Barclay
New York, New York
4:28 P.M. EDT
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Thank you very much. Thank you.
Well, thank you all for being here. We’ve had a tremendous three days in New York, at the United Nations. I want to thank the Secretary-General. It’s been really incredible what’s been taking place. And he’s been a fantastic host to a lot of countries.
The meetings I had on a bilat, or close, were pretty staggering. I think we set a new record, but you’ll have to check that out. The — we met very, very — for pretty extended periods of time, either two and two, one on one, or just about at that level with Pakistan, Poland, New Zealand, Singapore, Egypt, South Korea, United Kingdom, India, Iraq, Argentina, Germany, Brazil, France, Japan, Ukraine, Honduras, El Salvador, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, UAE, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. Other than that, we weren’t too busy over the last three days.
And, unfortunately, the press doesn’t even cover it. You know, we have — we’ve made some fantastic deals, like with Japan. For farmers, we have a tremendous trade deal with Japan. And that doesn’t get covered because you waste your time on nonsense.
The PMI manufacturers’ index has gone substantially up, which was an incredible — Larry Kudlow, wherever you may be — Larry, please stand up. He just gave me these numbers. And existing new home sales are through the roof. Just came out. Oil prices have gone down ever since the Saudi Arabia incident, and they’ve gone down very substantially. So, we have plenty of oil. But those numbers were surprising to you, Larry. And the extent of the increase. Is that a correct statement? So thank you, Larry Kudlow.
We think we’ll make this little announcement to you because — important. You know the so-called whistleblower? The one that didn’t have any first-class, or first-rate, or second-tier information, from what I understand. You’ll have to figure that out for yourself. But I’ve spoken with Leader Kevin McCarthy and the Republicans — many of them — and we were going to do this anyway, but I’ve informed them — all of the House members — that I fully support transparency on the so-called whistleblower information, even though it was supposedly second-hand information, which is sort of interesting.
And other things have come out about the whistleblower that are also maybe even more interesting. But also insist on transparency from Joe Biden and his son Hunter on the millions of dollars that have been quickly and easily taken out of Ukraine and China. Millions of dollars. Millions and millions of dollars taken out very rapidly while he was Vice President. And I think they should have transparency for that. I’ve informed the Leader about that.
And additionally, I demand transparency from Democrats who went to Ukraine and attempted to force the new President, who I met and is an outstanding person. I just met a little while ago; some of you were there. I think he’s going to be outstanding. He got elected on the basis of corruption. He wants to end corruption in Ukraine, and I think that’s great.
But they went there and they wanted to force the new President to do things that they wanted under the form of political threat. They threatened him if he didn’t do things. Now, that’s what they’re accusing me of, but I didn’t do it. I didn’t threaten anybody. In fact, the press was asking questions of the President of Ukraine. And he said, “No pressure.” I used the word “pressure.” I think he used the word “push,” but he meant pressure, but it’s the same thing. No push, no pressure, no nothing. It’s all a hoax, folks. It’s all a big hoax.
And the sad thing about this hoax is that we work so hard with all of these countries — and I mean really hard. This has been — I’ve been up from early in the morning to late in the evening, and meeting with different countries all for the good of our country, and the press doesn’t even cover all of this. And it’s disappearing — it’s really disappointing also to those countries that are with us and spend so much time with us.
So, we want transparency. We’ve informed Kevin McCarthy about transparency. And we said, “Vote for it.” So I think you’ll have close to 100 percent of the Republican votes, I hope.
And it got almost no attention, but in May, CNN reported that Senators Robert Menendez, Richard Durbin, and Patrick Leahy wrote a letter to Ukraine’s Prosecutor General expressing concern at the closing of four investigations they said were “critical.” In the letter, they implied that their support for U.S. assistance to Ukraine was at stake and that if they didn’t do the right thing, they wouldn’t get any assistance. Gee, doesn’t that sound familiar? Doesn’t that sound familiar?
And Chris Murphy — who I’ve been dealing with on guns — you know, so nice. He’s always, “Oh, no, we want to work it out. We want to work it out.” But they’re too busy wasting their time on the witch hunt. So, Senator Chris Murphy literally threatened the President of Ukraine that, if he doesn’t do things right, they won’t have Democrat support in Congress. So you’re going to look all of this up.
One other thing — I’m just going off of certain notes and elements of what we’ve been doing over the last three days, but this just came up a few minutes ago: The “Amazon-Washington Post” just put out a fake article that Acting Director of National Intelligence, Joseph Maguire — who I’ve gotten to know, and he’s a tough cookie — and I was surprised; I was shocked to hear this — was going to quit, blaming the White House for something that they wouldn’t let him talk openly, freely. And I was shocked because I know Joe, and he’s tough. A tough guy.
And I was really surprised to hear he was going to quit. Before I could even either talk to him or talk to anybody else, he put out a statement — I didn’t speak to Joe yet — but he said, “At no time have I considered resigning my position.” In other words, the story in the Washington Post was a fake.
“At no time have I considered resigning my position since assuming this role on August 16, 2019. I have never quit anything in my life, and I am not going to start now. I’m committed to leading the intelligence community to address the diverse and complex threats facing our nation.” That’s from the Acting Director of National Intelligence, a very good man, Joseph Maguire.
So we’re having a great period of time. Our country is the strongest it’s ever been economically. Our numbers are phenomenal. Wilbur, thank you. And Larry. Everybody. The numbers are phenomenal. Our economy is the strongest in the world. We’re the largest economy in the world.
Had my opponent won, we would be second right now because China was catching us so rapidly, we would’ve been second by this time. And unless somebody does a very poor job as President, we’re going to be first for a long way, because we’ve picked up trillions and trillions of dollars in value and worth of our country, and China has lost trillions and trillions of dollars, and millions of jobs, and their supply chain. And they want to make a deal.
This year, America came to the United Nations stronger than we have ever been before: Since my election, the United States has not only brought our economy to a level that we have never seen, the most jobs that we’ve ever had — you know you’ve heard me say it many times — African American, Asian American, Hispanic American, the best unemployment numbers we’ve ever had. And the most and best employment numbers: 160 million — very close to that number — in jobs. We’ve never been anywhere close.
Wages are up, and inequality is down. Something that people don’t like writing about. But wages are up. I used to speak during the campaign, and I’d talk about wages where people were making less money three years ago than they were making 21 years, 22 years ago, and they’d have two jobs and three jobs. When I say “three years ago,” I’m talking into the area sometime prior to the election. And they were doing very badly. And now, for the first time in many years, wages are up and employment is up, and unemployment is down. And it’s a beautiful thing to watch.
In a week of active and ambitious diplomacy here at the United Nations, America renewed our friendships. We advanced our values greatly and made clear to everyone that the United States will always defend our citizens to promote prosperity.
I met with Prime Minister Boris Johnson, at length, of the United Kingdom, continuing our discussions on a magnificent, new bilateral trade deal. So we’ll see what happens with respect to Brexit, but I suspect we’ll have a fantastic deal with the UK. It should be much bigger than it has been over the last number of years. Over the last 20 years, frankly. It should be a much bigger deal.
That’s true with many countries. We’re going to have much bigger trade deals with a lot of countries that have an opportunity to come. And they all want to do business with the United States, especially now.
Earlier today, I stood alongside Prime Minister Abe of Japan — a friend of mine, a great gentleman. Had a great reelection. And we signed a terrific new trade deal, which tremendously helps our farmers and ranchers, and technology. The technology companies are really big beneficiaries.
We also held very productive conversations with leaders of Pakistan, India. And many other nations are achieving stronger ties of fair and reciprocal trade. And with respect to Pakistan and India, we talked about Kashmir. And whatever help I can be, I said — I offered, whether it’s arbitration or mediation, or whatever it has to be, I’ll do whatever I can. Because they’re at very serious odds right now, and hopefully that’ll get better.
You look at the two gentlemen heading those two countries — two good friends of mine — I said, “Fellas, work it out. Just work it out.” Those are two nuclear countries. They’ve got to work it out.
This week, we also made incredible strides on national security with President Duda of Poland. We signed a joint declaration advancing defense cooperation. And, crucially, Poland has agreed to put up 100 percent of the money — something I don’t think you’ve ever heard said before. But they’re going to put up 100 percent of the money, of hosting additional U.S. military personnel that we’ll be taking from various other countries. We won’t have more over; we’ll have — we’ll be moving them around.
Poland is building us phenomenal new facilities. They’re spending everything, and they’re going to really do a job. But we’ll be moving a few thousand soldiers, and Poland will be paying that for it.
Together with Prime Minister Lee of Singapore, I signed an important agreement extending our defense cooperation. This hasn’t been changed in many years. Then, yesterday, I met with prospective members of the Middle East Strategic Alliance, which is a group that I know very well; I know all of them. And through this effort, the nations of the Middle East are taking more responsibility for securing their own future and their own neighborhood. And they’re also reimbursing us and paying us for a lot of the military work that we incredibly do.
But because we’re now independent, energy-wise — we’re energy independent — we have very few boats going over the Middle East. We used to have them going through the Straits all the time. And you probably noticed that, every once in a while, they go after somebody else’s. They haven’t gone after ours yet. If they do, they’ve get big problems. But we have very few boats going over there. They were saying the other day, they’ve never attacked an American boat, and I’m not asking for trouble. But if they do, they know they have far bigger trouble. But then they said, “But, you know, we don’t see very many American boats over here anymore.”
This week also brought extraordinary progress to nations of our own hemisphere. In recent days, we’ve achieved historic asylum cooperation agreements with El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. We were with El Salvador today. A great young gentleman became the President. He’s strong and tough, and he’s taking care of crime. He was really something today. I was very impressed with him. And likewise with Honduras, who we met. We signed a cooperation agreement with both, and also with Guatemala.
We’re working with our partners in Central America to ensure that asylum-seekers can pursue relief as close to their home countries as possible. That’ll make a tremendous difference at our southern border.
And Mexico — I have to say, President Lopez Obrador has been outstanding — an outstanding partner. And he’s doing a great job in Mexico. The cartels are way down, and the numbers — our Secretary is here now — the numbers are way down. Way, way down. And we’re doing that without the help of Congress, meaning the Democrats in Congress who won’t give us a single vote to take care of loopholes.
We have loopholes that are so horrible, and it would be so easy to fix. And they know they should be fixed but they don’t want to do because they don’t want to give Trump any credit because it’s all about the election. That’s all they care about. They don’t care about our country; they care about the election.
And the sad part is, with all of the tremendous work that we’ve done this weekend — whether it’s Secretary Mnuchin or Secretary Pompeo, who had some outstanding, outstanding meetings — with all of this tremendous work that we’ve done, the press doesn’t even cover it. And the Democrats did this hoax during the United Nations week. It was perfect. Because this way, it takes away from these tremendous achievements that we’re taking care of doing, that we’re involved in in New York City, at the United Nations.
So that was all planned, like everything else. It was all planned. And the witch hunt continues, but they’re getting hit hard in this witch hunt, because when they look at the information, it’s a joke. Impeachment? For that? When you have a wonderful meeting, or you have a wonderful phone conversation?
I think you should ask. We actually — you know, that was the second conversation. I think you should ask for the first conversation also. I can’t believe they haven’t, although I heard there’s a — there’s a rumor out they want the first conversation. It was beautiful. It was just a perfect conversation.
But I think you should do that. I think you should do, and I think you should ask for VP Pence’s conversation because he had a couple conversations also. I can save you a lot of time. They’re all perfect. Nothing was mentioned of any import other than congratulations. But the word is that they’re going to ask for the first phone conversation. You can have it anytime you need it. And also Mike Pence’s conversations, which were, I think, one or two of them. They were perfect. They were all perfect.
It’s very sad what the Democrats are doing to this country. They’re dividing. They’re belittling. They’re demeaning our country. So many leaders came up to me today and they said, “Sir, what you go through, no President has ever gone through. And it’s so bad for your country.” People laugh at the stupidity of what they’ve asked for. And here we could do asylum. We could do all of these different things so easily. We could do asylum quickly. We could do loopholes; get rid of them.
Instead, we actually made deals with Mexico and with Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras. And we’re doing it with them instead of with our Congress, but we’re doing it. We get it done.
The wall is being built, by the way. It got little coverage. I went to the border. It’s going up in New Mexico. It’s going up in Arizona. It’s going up in California, believe it or not. They really wanted that wall in California, in San Diego. As soon as it was completed, they said, “We don’t want a wall.” They were begging me for a wall. I should take it out and move it to another location.
We were with the Governor — spoke to him a lot — but the Governor of Texas, Lieutenant Governor of Texas, Attorney General of Texas, the senators of Texas — Cornyn, Ted Cruz. And we’re building an incredible wall. That’s going to — number one, it’s going to look great. It’s going to be virtually impossible to cross unless you’re one hell of a mountain climber. It’s very tough. It’s going to be very tough to get people and drugs over those walls, because they’re the real deal.
I went to the Secretary of Homeland security, and he got all his people together. I said, “Give me four walls — your optimum. Every single thing included.” And they give me 20 percent less, 20 percent less, and 20 percent less — meaning, less cost. They came back, they said, “This is the wall, sir. This would be the best.” We have the panels on top, which are anti-climb panels. I don’t know if you noticed the steel on top. We have a different design for a different area, but this anti-climb is very tough. They’ve — we had people going out and real climbers telling us which is the toughest to climb. But these are anti-climb panels. Very tough to get across.
And the wall is going up, many miles a week. And we hope to have over 400, but maybe as much as 500 miles, which we’ll pretty much do it because you have a lot of natural barriers; you have mountains, you have really rough rivers. You have some really rough land that you can’t cross very easily. So they serve as their natural walls. But we — we’ll have, we think, over 400, but we could even have 500 miles.
To combat the malice, corruption of both the Venezuelan and Iranian dictatorships, today I issued proclamations suspending the entry into the United States of senior regime officials and their families.
And further, to promote American values, on Monday I was proud to be the first President in history to host a meeting at the United Nations —
I’m so surprised; first President for this. I can’t believe that I’m first. I spoke to Franklin Graham about that. I can’t believe it.
— at the United Nations, on protecting religious freedom and liberty for people around the world.
While some partisans and unelected bureaucrats in Washington may choose to fight every day against the interests and beliefs of the American people, my administration is standing up for the American people like no administration has in many, many years. You forgot the American people. You totally forgot the American people.
This week, every — every week, I really can say — of my presidency, we’re standing up for American prosperity, American security, and the American way of life. And together, with our friends and partners, we’re building a more peaceful, prosperous, and promising future.
We have a tremendous relationship now with a lot of nations that are very happy with what’s going on, and that includes in South America, where they’ve been so helpful, where nobody thought this would be possible. The relationship with Mexico is an example, or El Salvador, or Honduras, or Guatemala. Nobody even knew about it. Yet, we sent them hundreds of millions of dollars, and all we got back was caravans of people pouring in.
We had tremendous — we had tremendous — it was terrible. And we’ve got that stopped, and the countries are now helping us. And we stopped those payments, by the way. We don’t pay those countries that money anymore. But I will tell you, if they’re as good as they seem to be — they’re really doing a job on crime and stopping the wrong people from leaving and coming to the United States — we’ll be helping them a lot with economic development projects and other things.
So, with that, we had a tremendous three days. It was beautiful to see. Made a lot of new friends. I read you a list of all the countries I saw pretty much one on one. And it’s been very busy, but it’s been very, very fruitful.
So we could take a couple of questions. I’d love some questions on some of the things that we accomplished at UNGA, instead of the witch hunt — the phony witch hunt questions, which I know that’s what you want to ask because it’s probably better for you, but it’s not better for the country.
So maybe we’ll take a few — a few questions. Please.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. You suggested that you didn’t do anything wrong in the course of your conversations with the Ukrainian President. But can you explain to the American people why it is appropriate for an American President to ask a foreign leader for information about a political rival, and what you would have said if you discovered that Barack Obama perhaps had asked a foreign leader for information about you before your campaign for the presidency?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Yeah. Well, that’s what he did, isn’t it, really? When you think about it.
Look, that whole witch hunt was started, and hopefully that’ll all come out. But there’s been some fantastic books written that just came out — whether you will look at Gregg Jarrett, or McCarthy’s book that just — just came out recently, and so many other books. And a lot of books are coming out. When you start reading those books, you see what they did to us. What they’ve done to this country is a disgrace. They’ve hurt this country very badly. And no other President should have to go through what I’ve gone through.
The President — the new President of Ukraine is looking to stop corruption. There’s a lot of corruption going on, and there was corruption. I just told you about senators that threatened him with votes and no money coming into Ukraine if they do things. That’s really what people are trying to say that I did, but the only difference is I didn’t do it. You take a look at that call; it was perfect. I didn’t do it. There was no quid pro quo, but there was with Biden and there was with these senators. And they threatened. They said, “You do this, you do that. We’re not going to give you votes.” That’s — that’s the real deal.
So we have an honest group of people that have been maligned. And, you know, it’s — a lot of people say I’ll do even better. I’m very happy. Yesterday, I guess we had a 53 poll, and a lot of people say add 10 points to anything. Anybody voting for Trump, you can add — anytime you get a poll, you can add 10 points or 7 points or 6 points. Take it any way you want. But I don’t know if I consider that to be a compliment, but in one way it is a compliment.
And I guess that’s what happened in the last election: Far more people came to vote than anybody thought possible.
Q So why should the American people then be comfortable with an American President asking a foreign leader for information about an American citizen?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, I think you can look at your senators and you can look at Biden, and you can look at all these other people. But what we’re looking for is corruption. An investigation started, called the “Russian witch hunt,” affectionately. And it was a total phony scam. It was set up by people within the government to try and stop somebody from getting elected.
And after that person — namely, me — won, and convincingly won at 306 to 223 in the Electoral College — which, by the way, when you run a race, if you’re running electoral — you know, if you go by the College, Electoral College, that’s a much different race than running popular vote. And it’s like the hundred-yard dash or the mile. You train differently.
And I can’t help it that my opponent didn’t go to Wisconsin and should have gone much more to Michigan and Pennsylvania and other places. But that’s the way it is. We won election, convincingly. Convincingly. And then you had the text message on, “Well, if she doesn’t win, we’ve got an insurance policy.” How bad was that? You know the insurance policy? That’s sort of what has been taking place over the last number of years — the insurance policy.
No, there are a lot of very dishonest people. We’re the ones that played it straight. And you know what? The millions of people out there that are looking at what’s going on — those people understand it. They see it. And they think it’s disgusting. And our people are being hurt, and our country is being hurt.
When Nancy Pelosi allows her position to be taken over by radical far-left socialists, or worse, that’s pretty bad. That’s pretty bad — especially when the senators and all of these other people have actually done what they’re accusing me of doing, which I didn’t do.
I’m going to have Mike Pompeo say a couple of words. I’m going to have Steve Mnuchin say a couple of words. And then we’ll do a couple of more questions.
SECRETARY POMPEO: Mr. President, I thought I’d start by talking about Iran. We had a productive week. We saw the Europeans take a position with respect to the attacks that took place in Saudi Arabia, making clear this was Iran, just as President Trump and I had been saying, and have now joined us in saying that the existing JCPOA framework is not going to work, it’s not going to solve the world’s problems, it’s not going to create Middle East stability.
Then we had a good set of meetings with our Middle East allies as well. The President joined for a meeting of the GCC where we talked again about how we can help deter. We want peace. We want a peaceful resolution with the Islamic Republic of Iran. We’re hoping we can get that way. In the end, it’ll be up to the Iranians to make that decision, whether they’ll choose violence and hate — and the President said in his speech yesterday to the General Assembly — if their bloodthirst will continue.
We hope that’s the (inaudible). We hope we can get the opportunity to negotiate with them and get an outcome that’s good for both of them, for the United States, to make sure that they never have a nuclear weapon and that they can’t foment their terror with ballistic missiles and in the way they have all around the world. And I think we made real progress uniting the world on that here over these past few days. Thank you.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Thank you.
SECRETARY MNUCHIN: As Secretary Pompeo said on Iran, we had very good discussions with all of our allies about the sanctions program, which is the maximum pressure, and unity on the sanctions program. The Europeans made it very clear they would not do anything without our consent.
And then, on the economic front, we had the entire economic team here for all the meetings: Secretary Ross, Larry Kudlow; Ambassador Lighthizer just left to go back to D.C. He’s working hard on trying to get USMCA passed. But we had a lot of productive discussions. The Japanese trade deal and a lot of discussions on investing in the U.S., more jobs in the U.S., and more trade. Thank you.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Okay. Go ahead, please.
Q Thank you. Kristina Partsinevelos, Fox Business. I want to focus on markets, because I’ll leave it to everybody else to talk about impeachment. Markets reacted positively after you spoke about China, and that it would happen sooner than — rather than unexpectedly.
Yet, you have the Foreign Minister of China saying that they have no intention of, you know, unseating the United States. And yet, they’re investing heavily in infrastructure and military.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Not anymore, maybe.
Q But what — what is different this time, though?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: And maybe they just say that, Kristina.
Q What is different this time, though? The fact that you’re saying it’s progressing.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Oh, I just think it’s progressing. I think they want to make a deal. They’re losing their supply chain. You know, it’s getting killed.
Q Do you have something specific?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I don’t want to say that. But I can tell you that these two men — and, in this case, more specifically, Steve, we’re having some very good conversations.
And I guess it’s next week that a group is coming in and the week after. So we have a lot of — we have a lot of talks going on, and also by telephone.
They want to make a deal. And you know why they want to make a deal? Because they’re losing their jobs, and because their supply chain is going to hell. And companies are moving out of China, and they’re moving to lots of other places, including the United States. And that’s not good; that’s far worse than they thought.
And, by the way, in the meantime, we’re taking in billions and billions of dollars in tariffs. We’re taking in tremendous numbers in tariffs. And we’re helping our farmers who got targeted. Now, by the way, China is starting to buy our agricultural product again. They’re starting to go with the beef and all of the different things — pork. Very big on pork.
But if you look and if you see — and they actually put out, I think, a statement. But they’re starting, very heavy, to buy our ag again. No, they want to make a deal. And they should want to make a deal. The question is: Do we want to make a deal?
Q If USMCA doesn’t pass through Congress, is that it for NAFTA?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, that would be a shame. Well, I don’t want to answer that question, but you know how I feel about NAFTA. I think NAFTA is the worst trade deal ever made, although I also happen to think World Trade Organization was not one of the greats. Not one of the greats. That was the creation of China, which went like a rocket ship from the day they signed. It was — it was terrible.
But, no, we’re going to find out. That’s going to be a very interesting question, with Nancy and Chuck and all of these people focusing on the witch hunt because they can’t beat us at the ballot. They can’t beat us at the ballot. And they’re not going to win the presidential. We’re having great polls. We have internal polls that are — Ohio, Iowa. Pennsylvania is looking good. North Carolina.
We just won two races that a lot of people — we thought we were going to lose both of those races. One was down 17 points three weeks before the race, and he ended up winning by a substantial margin — by a substantial margin. And — Dan Bishop.
And then we had a second race, as you know, and he was up one or two points and ended up winning by — what was it? Twenty-five points or some incredible — I’ll ask you folks because I don’t want to be inaccurate. Otherwise, I’ll have a front-page story: “We have breaking news. Trump exaggerated.”
But he won by many, many points. And he was leading by maybe two, maybe three, but he won by — in the twenties. So it’s — it’s been — so we’re looking great in North Carolina, looking great in Florida.
And you had one or two congressmen Democrats say, “Listen, we can’t beat them at the election, so let’s impeach him.” Right? Didn’t you hear — Al Green. That’s a beauty. He’s a real beauty, that guy. But he said, very distinctively, it’s all — it was all over the place. I don’t know — they’re trying to lose that tape, I guess.
But he said, “We can’t…” Essentially, he said, “We can’t beat him. Let’s impeach him.” That’s pretty — that’s pretty dangerous stuff.
Steve, go ahead.
Q Thank you, sir. You had expressed some concerns about the precedent of releasing the transcript.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Yeah. I don’t like it.
Q Why did you go ahead and do it?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Because I was getting such fake news, and I just thought it would be better. And now they’re asking for the first phone conversation, and I’ll release that too, if it’s important to you. But they’re asking for — because I had a conversation previous — on a previous election plateau that he had hit. The — the current president hit a couple of different plateaus. And I spoke to him, previous to the call that we released, which was a very innocent call — very, very innocent; very nice call.
And as he said, we were — “I wasn’t pushed. I wasn’t pushed,” meaning pressured. He wasn’t pressured at all.
But I don’t like the concept of releasing calls because when a president or prime minister, or a king or a queen, calls the United States, you don’t like to say, “Gee, we’re going to release your call to the fake-news media, and they’re going to make you look like a fool.” What happens is, it’s hard to do business that way. You want to have people feel comfortable.
So I hated it, but you folks were saying such lies, such horrible things about a call that was so innocent and so nice. In fact, Lindsey Graham said to me, when he read it — it was very interesting. He’s a good man. He’s a smart man. He said, “I can’t believe it. I never knew you could be this, really, nice to a person.” He said, “I cannot believe it. You were so nice. I didn’t think you had that in you to be so nice.”
I was nice. I’m nice to a lot of people. People don’t understand that. But I was. But he was shocked that it was such a nice call. There — he said, “There is nothing here.” And all fair people say the same thing.
But I don’t like the precedent, Steve. I don’t like it where you’re dealing with heads of state and to think that their call is going to be released. But I felt that — and, you know, we spoke to Ukraine about it. Mike actually called up his counterpart, and we spoke to Ukraine about it because we want to — because they could have been — if that they didn’t want us to do it, we would not have done it.
But he actually said, “That was a very innocent call. You can release it all you want.”
Q And are you now braced for long impeachment saga?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, I thought we won. I thought it was dead. It was dead. The Mueller report — no obstruction, no collusion. You look at all of the things that happened.
Corey Lewandowski was fantastic the other day, as a person that they have been tormenting. You look at all the people that they’ve tormented, all the legal fees. People came here with bright eyes; they wanted to make life so great for other people. And they left where they spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees that they didn’t have. And it’s a sad thing. What these Democrats have done to ruin lives is so sad.
I’ve seen people with only good intention. They came to Washington because they wanted to make the United States and the world a better place. And they went home — they were dark. They got hit by Mueller’s subpoenas. I think there were 2,500 subpoenas, or some ridiculous number. Five hundred people were interviewed, and yet, they don’t interview Joe Biden and his son.
If you’re Democrat, you have automatic protection. That’s years and years of people putting in certain people into positions. But when you look at all of the — all of the trauma that these fakers, of course — and the press — look, the press is — much of the press is not only fake, it’s corrupt. These stories they write are corrupt; they’re so wrong. And they know that.
You know, it used to be — I used to get great press until I ran for politics. I mean, I used to be the king of getting good press. I was very good at it. And I got good. I mean, they covered me well for what — otherwise, I probably wouldn’t be here.
And once I ran, I said, “Boy, this is incredible.” But if you see the way they treat my family — used to be treated great. My family worked so hard. The people that work with me — these people — all of these people, they work so hard. They’ve done such a good —
Look, we have the greatest economy we’ve ever had. We have a military — two and a half trillion dollars. We’ve rebuilt our military. You don’t hear the vets complaining. We got Choice approved. It couldn’t be approved.
But when you see what happened with the viciousness, and when you see little Adam Schiff go out and lie and lie and stand at the mic — smart guy, by the way — stand at the mic and act like he’s so serious. And then he goes into a room with Nadler, and they must laugh their asses off. They must laugh their asses off.
But it’s so bad for our country. People have said — Rush Limbaugh — great man; Sean Hannity said it. A lot of people have said it. Mark Levin. They said they don’t know if one man anywhere in the world, with all the men they know — or woman — that could handle what I’ve had to handle.
And I think that’s true, but I handle it. To me, it’s like putting on a suit.
All right, how about one more question? A question on the economy. A question on the economy.
Go ahead. Go ahead.
Q Hi, Mr. President. VPItv from Venezuela — Caracas, Venezuela.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Good. Good. Wow.
Q Yeah.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: How are you doing?
Q We made it.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: How are you doing over there?
Q Pretty bad. Our situation is pretty bad.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Yeah. I would say “pretty bad.” Yeah. Sad.
Q Yeah. But we are fighting.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: And it was one of the great countries and one of the richest countries not so long ago — 15 years ago. It’s incredible.
Q But we are going to make it.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Right. I agree with that. And we’re helping you.
Q Yeah.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: We’re helping you.
Q Yeah, I know. And thank you.
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Go ahead.
Q I have two questions —
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Go ahead.
Q — to take advantage of this. Maduro traveled to Russia and Diosdado Cabello to North Korea — two of the most antagonist nations in the U.S. interests. What can be done to contain this? What are they looking for in that country? And because the special envoy, Mr. Abrams, said that the Russians are willing to negotiate it. This is one question.
And the other: Mr. President, you say that the socialists is one of the biggest challenges, you said yesterday in the United Nations. But the region is far from safe. Maduro is still a dictator, full in power. (Inaudible) in Argentina and Brazil are on their (inaudible) about the socialist and populist. Are you worried about it?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Well, I just say that socialism will never happen in the United States. It can’t happen in the United States. And Venezuela — unfortunately, I have to use your country as the example of what socialism can do, how it can tear the fabric of a country apart. Because I know a lot about Venezuela.
I’ve had many, many friends of mine come from Venezuela. They live — many in Miami — a certain section of Miami, I won’t mention the name because they’ll say I’m thinking about my business, and I’m not. But they are fantastic people and they like your President. They voted overwhelmingly for me. They like what I’m doing for Venezuela.
We have Venezuela very much in our hearts and very much in our sights. And we’re watching it very carefully. And you know what I would say? We’re giving millions and millions of dollars in aid — not that we want to, from the Maduro standpoint, but we have to because, on a humanitarian — people are dying. They have no food. They have no water. They have no nothing. They’re dying. No medicine. Their hospitals are closed or — or don’t even have electricity. It’s so sad to see.
Let me just say that we have it under control. We are watching it very carefully. And we’re going to be very, very —
Q Russia (inaudible) —
PRESIDENT TRUMP: We’re — we’re watching it very carefully, including other countries that may or may not be playing games. We’re watching it very closely.
Q But, you know, if Russia is talking with the USA or Guaidó, what can you tell — about us?
PRESIDENT TRUMP: Just put this in the back of your mind: It’s all going to be fine. We know everything that you said, and it’s all going to be fine. We’re very much involved. We very much know what’s going on, and we’re very much involved. Okay?
Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you very much.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Dr. Rich Swierhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDr. Rich Swier2019-09-26 06:35:472019-09-26 06:35:47VIDEO: President Trump Highlights America’s Great Accomplishments at the United Nations’ 74th Session
