Omnibus Spending Bill Does Not Secure the Border, but Further Incentivizes and Enables Illegal Immigration

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Washington, D.C. — The 117th Congress finally wrapped up business by approving a lame-duck, pork-laden $1.7 trillion spending bill – consisting of more than 4,000 pages that not a single member had the time to read and fully analyze – funding the federal government through the remainder of the fiscal year.

Passage of the omnibus coincides with a full-blown crisis along our southern border that is about to get a whole lot worse, as the Biden administration is close to ending Title 42, the last remaining mechanism in place under which a limited number of border-crossers are being removed from the country. Yet, not only did the Democratic-led Congress reject an amendment to keep Title 42 in place, they expressly barred increased funding for U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) from being used to secure the border.

“The final spending package approved by a Congress on their way out the door leaves little doubt that chaos at the border is the policy of the Democratic Party today and that their goal is to create even more of it,” charged Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). “Only a party that affirmatively wants open borders – regardless of the fiscal, security, and humanitarian costs – would let the one remaining policy that allows for the expedited removal of even some illegal migrants lapse, and deliberately tie the hands of our border enforcement agency.

“Let’s be clear, the president can restore operational control of the border simply by enforcing laws that are already on the books – many of which he voted for as a senator. Instead, he and his party continue deflect blame by claiming they inherited a broken system. The truth is they deliberately broke it themselves and are standing in the way of efforts to fix it.

“Rather than do anything to regain control of our borders, the omnibus is focused entirely on processing illegal aliens as quickly as possible and transporting them to already overwhelmed communities all across the United States. This massive spending bill effectively turns CBP into a federally administered travel agency for illegal aliens and saddles state and local governments with the costs of education, health care, housing and other basic needs for the endless flow of illegal aliens the Biden administration is waiving into the country,” concluded Stein.

Below is a summary of harmful immigration provisions included in the omnibus spending bill at the urging of Democrats, as well as proposals that were successfully defeated due in part to FAIR’s aggressively lobbying efforts.:

Harmful provisions of the omnibus:

  • Provides $1.563 billion for CBP “border management” but does not allow using those funds to hire permanent border security officers, deport illegal aliens (only allows transportation to American communities), or expand border security technologies and capabilities unless it is for improving the processing of illegal aliens. This is not “border management,” it is $1.563 billion to essentially convert CBP into a federal travel agency for illegal aliens.
  • Provides $800 million from CBP to FEMA to pay for “sheltering and other services” through grant programs awarded to open border aligned non-governmental organizations and charities. This broad appropriation could be viewed as enticing others to illegally enter the country and there is no prohibition against funds being distributed to organizations in the interior, meaning that illegal; aliens could be sheltered throughout the country under this section.
  • Prohibits the use of funds for border wall construction in certain areas.
  • Allows the Office of Refugee Resettlement to accept private donations from politically motivated organizations for the care of unaccompanied alien children.
  • Provides funds to both CBP and ICE to transport unaccompanied alien children, demonstrating that domestic transportation throughout the United States is a large part of CBP and ICE operations. This is a key enticement for parents to pay smugglers to take their children on the dangerous trek up to the southern border.
  • Provides millions for a controversial case management pilot program to aid illegal aliens facing deportation – which is being overseen by a nonprofit that has previously called for the defunding and abolition of ICE.
  • Provides $29 million for the Justice Department’s Legal Orientation Program, which empowers NGOs to coach large groups of detained aliens on immigration court proceedings. The effectiveness of this program is dubious as it does not provide actual legal counsel to aliens, the aliens who use this program are less likely to get an attorney and their matters take longer to resolve. Additionally, program participant organizations often blur the line between providing basic information about the process and providing legal advice.
  • Provides $25 million for the USCIS Citizenship and Integration Grant Program, a program utilized by many of the same NGOs receiving federal grant money to process illegal aliens. This self-congratulatory grant program has been routinely awarded to organizations involved in active litigation against DHS and does nothing to enhance the administration of the immigration system.
  • Leaves it up to the DHS Inspector General’s discretion whether to allocate funds for partnerships between state and local law enforcement to assist in enforcing immigration laws. While seemingly an independent auditor, The DHS Office of Inspector General has been mired in reports of political bias. We have already witnessed the dangerous consequences of an administration unwilling to utilize the 287(g) program as the Obama era saw a plethora of cancelled agreements. Congress is essentially relinquishing control of a critical force multiplier for immigration enforcement.
  • Allows detention contracts to be rescinded based on arbitrary performance evaluations.
  • Extends discretionary authority for DHS to issue more H-2B guest worker visas than the cap allows, which displaces American workers and drives down wages.
  • Provides funds to eliminate processing backlogs and expedite adjudication of Afghan Special Immigrant Visa cases, as well as a cap increase of 4,000. Recent reports have exposed the lack of proper vetting for many of the Afghans in the program and the associated risks to public safety and national security. Any actions taken to expedite processing will detract from security checks and further vetting activities and increase the risks.
  • All budget increases directed towards immigration enforcement are below inflation. An unprecedented border crisis calls for funds at appropriate levels – the increases are simply insufficient.

Among the damaging immigration proposals that were defeated or withdrawn during the lame duck:

  • A mass amnesty proposal led by Senators Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) and Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) in exchange for an extension of weakened Title 42 and other meaningless promises of future immigration enforcement.
  • The Afghan Adjustment Act, which would have granted permanent residence to largely unvetted Afghans who were allowed to enter the country under President Biden’s abuse of parole authority. Most of the Afghans who arrived in the U.S. after the administration’s disastrous withdrawal in 2021 played no role in assisting U.S. forces.
  • An agriculture bill containing both an amnesty for illegal aliens and an expanded guestworker program. The last farmworker amnesty, crafted in part by current Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer when he was in the House, was the most fraud-ridden immigration program in American history.
  • The Biden Administration’s attempt to slash ICE detention capacity by 30 percent.
  • The Sinema-Tester amendment to the omnibus, which sought to process and release illegal aliens into our country more efficiently.
  • The EAGLE Act, which would have resulted in more than 90 percent of employment-based green cards being awarded to citizens of just two countries: China and India.
  • The misleadingly named Veterans Service Recognition Act, which would have provided amnesty for illegal alien relatives of veterans and even allowed deported criminals to return the U.S.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Informed Americans Back Border Security. No Wonder the Media Isn’t Doing Their Job

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EDITORS NOTE: This FAIR column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Biden Regime to Drop Half a Million on Artificial Intelligence That Detects ‘Microaggressions’ on Social Media

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Full on police state.

Biden Admin to Drop Half a Million on Artificial Intelligence That Detects Microaggressions on Social Media

President Biden On His Administration’s New Actions On The Economy

By: Philip Caldwell • Washington Free Beacon •  December 21, 2022:

The Biden administration is set to dole out more than $550,000 in grants to develop an artificial intelligence model that can automatically detect and suppress microaggressions on social media, government spending records show.

The award, funded through President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, was granted to researchers at the University of Washington in March to develop technologies that could be used to protect online users from discriminatory language. The researchers have already received $132,000 and expect total government funding to reach $550,436 over the next five years.

The researchers are developing machine-learning models that can analyze social media posts to detect implicit bias and microaggressions, commonly defined as slights that cause offense to members of marginalized groups. It’s a broad category, but past research conducted by the lead researcher on the University of Washington project suggests something as tame as praising meritocracy could be considered a microaggression.

The Biden administration’s funding of the research comes as the White House faces growing accusations that it seeks to suppress free speech online. Biden last month suggested there should be an investigation into Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter after the billionaire declared the social media app would pursue a “free speech” agenda. Internal Twitter communications Musk released this month also revealed a prolonged relationship between the FBI and Twitter employees, with the agency playing a regular role in the platform’s content moderation.

Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton likened the Biden administration’s funding of the artificial intelligence research to the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts to “censor speech unapproved by the state.” For the Biden administration, Fitton said, the research is a “project to make it easier for their leftist allies to censor speech.”

A spokesman for the National Science Foundation, which issued the research grant, rebuffed criticism of the project, which he said “does not attempt to hamper free speech.” The project, the spokesman said, creates “automated ways of identifying biases in speech” and addresses the biases of human content moderators.

The research’s description doesn’t give examples of what comments would qualify as microaggressions—though it acknowledges they can be unconscious and unintentional. The project is led by computer science professor Yulia Tsvetkov, who has authored studies that suggest the artificial intelligence model might identify and suppress language many would consider inoffensive, such as comments praising the concept of meritocracy.

Tsvetkov coauthored a 2019 study titled “Finding Microaggressions in the Wild,” which categorized microaggressions into subcategories, one of which was the “myth” that “differences in treatment are due to one’s merit.” Examples of microaggressions laid out in the paper included statements like “Your mom is white, so it’s not like you’re really black,” and questions including “But where are you from, originally?”

Tsvetkov also coauthored a July article that analyzed the “prominence of positivity in #BlackLivesMatter tweets” during the June 2020 George Floyd riots. Tsvetkov and her colleagues determined positive emotions like “hope, pride, and optimism” were prevalent in pro-Black Lives Matter tweets, evidence they said contradicts narratives framing Black Lives Matter protesters as angry.

Conservative watchdog groups raised alarm over the Biden administration’s funding of the research, telling the Washington Free Beacon the project represents a White House effort to curb free speech online.

“It’s not the role of government to police speech that some might find either offensive or emotionally draining,” said Dan Schneider, vice president of the Media Research Center’s free speech division. “Government is supposed to be protecting our rights, not suppressing our rights.”

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Saying ‘American’ Is Now RACIST and Stanford University’s List of Other UNACCEPTABLE WORDS

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The Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative is a “multi-phase” project of Stanford’s IT leaders.

“Stanford University” – now there’s an unacceptable term.

What will it take for the people rise against this leftist scourge destroying the country?

Stanford Scrambles To Hide List Calling ‘American’ Racist or ‘Harmful’ Language

By: Valient News, December 22, 2022:

Despite Stanford’s claims, the debate on the term “Americans” arises not out of racism, but linguistic differences between English and Spanish speakers.

Stanford University has demanded that citizens of the United States should not be referred to as “Americans,” deeming it harmful and racist language use.

In May, Stanford published an index of offensive words, as part of their “Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative,” which they described as a “multi-phase, multi-year project to address harmful language in IT at Stanford.”

“The goal of the Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative is to eliminate* many forms of harmful language, including racist, violent, and biased (e.g., disability bias, ethnic bias, ethnic slurs, gender bias, implicit bias, sexual bias) language in Stanford websites and code,” the university wrote on its website.

Keep reading…

Guide to Acceptable Words: Behold the school’s Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative — Wall Street Journal

By The Editorial Board, Dec. 19, 2022:

Parodists have it rough these days, since so much of modern life and culture resembles the
Babylon Bee. The latest evidence is that Stanford University administrators in May published
an index of forbidden words to be eliminated from the school’s websites and computer code,
and provided inclusive replacements to help re-educate the benighted.

Call yourself an “American”? Please don’t. Better to say “U.S. citizen,” per the bias hunters,
lest you slight the rest of the Americas. “Immigrant” is also out, with “person who has
immigrated” as the approved alternative. It’s the iron law of academic writing: Why use one
word when four will do?

You can’t “master” your subject at Stanford any longer; in case you hadn’t heard, the school
instructs that “historically, masters enslaved people.” And don’t dare design a “blind study,”
which “unintentionally perpetuates that disability is somehow abnormal or negative,

Appeared in the December 20, 2022, print edition as ‘The Stanford Guide to Acceptable Words’.
furthering an ableist culture.” Blind studies are good and useful, but never mind; “masked
study” is to be preferred. Follow the science.

“Gangbusters” is banned because the index says it “invokes the notion of police action against
‘gangs’ in a positive light, which may have racial undertones.” Not to beat a dead horse (a
phrase that the index says “normalizes violence against animals”), but you used to have to get
a graduate degree in the humanities to write something that stupid.

The Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative is a “multi-phase” project of Stanford’s IT
leaders. The list took “18 months of collaboration with stakeholder groups” to produce, the university tells us. We can’t imagine what’s next, except that it will surely involve more make-
work for more administrators, whose proliferation has driven much of the rise in college

tuition and student debt. For 16,937 students, Stanford lists 2,288 faculty and 15,750
administrative staff.

The list was prefaced with (to use another forbidden word) a trigger warning: “This website
contains language that is offensive or harmful. Please engage with this website at your own
pace.”

Evidently it was all too much for some at the school to handle. On Monday, after the index
came to light on social media, Stanford hid it from public view. Without a password, you
wouldn’t know that “stupid” made the list.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Kari Lake Trial Bombshells: Data Expert Testifies ‘No Doubt’ She Would Have Won

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UPDATE: 

Everything the Corrupt Judge Had to Ignore to Kill Kari Lake’s Lawsuit

“We can conclude with a degree of mathematical certainty that this affected this chunk of voters. Is That enough to have changed the outcome? And I am offering the opinion that that range is enough to put the outcome in doubt.”

2022 Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake and her attorneys once again took the stand on Thursday as the trial moved forward proving  she was the rightful winner of the race.

Lawyers for Lake are focusing on problems with ballot printers at a majority of the polling places in Maricopa County, home to more than 60% of voters. The defective printers produced ballots that were too light to be read by the on-site tabulators at polling places. Lines backed up in some areas amid the chaos and confusion.

Expert in Kari Lake election suit: ‘No doubt’ she would have won without Maricopa Election Day chaos

The trial is set to conclude Thursday.

By Natalia Mittelstadt, Just The News, December 22, 2022:

Election modeling expert Richard Baris said Thursday in the Kari Lake election lawsuit that his projections showed as many as 40,000 voters were disenfranchised over Election Day chaos in Arizona’s Maricopa County, causing him to “have no doubt” that she would’ve won the gubernatorial election had there been no problems at polling centers.

Baris is the final witness for Lake in the scheduled two-day trial for her election lawsuit.

Baris testified that 25,000 to 40,000 voters were disenfranchised in the county as a result of roughly one in five vote centers suffering problems with ballot tabulator machines in the first hours of Election Day

“We’ve got about 20% of the locations out there where there’s an issue with the tabulator,” Maricopa Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates, a Republican, said on election night. Describing the problem, he said that after some voters filled out their ballot, the machine wouldn’t accept it. Since then, the county has admitted that 70 out of the 223 vote centers experienced issues on Election Day.

Election officials, however, assured voters their ballots would still be counted as a result of redundancy protocols.

The vote margin between Lake and Hobbs is 17,117 votes.

Baris said the net gain Lake would’ve received in the votes that weren’t cast on Election Day would have made her the winner of the Arizona gubernatorial election.

Baris testified that his firm, Big Data Poll, typically finds the difference in the exit-poll participation rates between early voters and Election Day voters is about 5-8%. In Maricopa County last month, however, the difference was about 20%, further suggesting that would-be voters there stayed home upon learning about voting machine problems.

That has “never happened to me before,” he said.

Following Baris’ testimony, Lake’s lawyers rested their case, and legal counsel for the defendants called their first witness, Kenneth Mayer, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Mayer, who said he has been involved in polling for the last 30 years, testified that there was no data to support the idea that ballot tabulator issues on Election Day caused voters to be disenfranchised and affected the outcome of the election.

The professor discounted Baris’ polling data, noting issues with self-reporting rather than using systematic methods, and said that Baris’ conclusions about his own data weren’t supported by the data.

During direct examination by the defendants’ legal counsel, he addressed the declarations regarding long wait times at vote centers, saying that the estimates widely varied and people generally do not correctly guess wait times due to the frustration of waiting in line.

Under cross-examination by Lake’s legal counsel, Mayer said that he didn’t verify the accuracy of the wait times provided by Maricopa County.

Lake, the 2022 Arizona GOP gubernatorial nominee, is suing her Democratic opponent, Governor-elect and Secretary of State Katie Hobbs; Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer; the county Board of Supervisors; and county Director of Elections Scott Jarrett.

Lake’s case alleges the “number of illegal votes cast in Arizona’s general election … far exceeds the 17,117 vote margin” between her and Hobbs.

The trial began Wednesday with the testimony of Richer, Jarrett, cybersecurity expert Clay Parikh, county temporary technician Bradley Benticort, and Republican National Committee attorney Mark Sonnenklar.

Following Baris’ testimony, the defendants’ legal team will call four witnesses to the stand, then each side will give closing arguments.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

RELATED ARTICLES:

Arizona County Elections Director Scott Jarrett Admits in Court Printer Settings Were Switched on Election Day – IT WAS ON PURPOSE! (VIDEO)

Maricopa County Witness Is a Woke Professor Who Wasn’t in Maricopa County on Election Day and Who Based His Testimony on What the County Told Him

Shady Democrat Operative Ryan Macias Testifies In Kari Lake’s Election Trial – DAMNING Evidence Against Him Presented During Cross-Examination – WATCH LIVE

Katie Hobbs Witness Makes Case for Tossing Out Malfunctioning Tabulator Machines: “One of the Most Common Issues that Arises on Election Day Operations”

Shady Democrat Operative Ryan Macias Testifies In Kari Lake’s Election Trial – DAMNING Evidence Against Him Presented During Cross-Examination – WATCH LIVE

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Omnibus Spending Bill Secures Border…of Islamic Terror State

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Omnibus bills are a disaster and this $1.7 trillion pork sandwich is no exception. It does however secure the border. Of every other Islamic country in the Middle East.

In another section, the behemoth bill requires $410 million to “remain available” to reimburse Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia and Oman for “enhanced border security.” At least $150 million of that must go to Jordan, according to the bill.

Lebanon, these days, is an Islamic terror state controlled by Iran’s Hezbollah. And yet, for some incomprehensible reason, we keep funding their security arrangements.

Jordan is only so much better. It’s due to fall to the Muslim Brotherhood at some point.

I’m not sure why we’re funding border security in Egypt, Tunisia or Oman for that matter. Oman is a reasonably wealthy oil state with a GDP of over $300 billion for a population of 5 million.

Do we really need to be covering their border security?

What about our border security which the Biden administration is fighting to dismantle by suing to get rid of Title 42?

AUTHOR

DANIEL GREENFIELD

RELATED TWEET:

RELATED ARTICLES:

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EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All of the 60 Largest Metros Experience Declines in Home Prices in November as Longest Boom Ends

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National Home Price Appreciation (HPA) Index – November 2022

Key takeaways:

  • National YoY HPA for November 2022 averaged 6.7%, down from 8.5% a month ago and 16.7% a year ago.
  • Historically, HPA in the low price tier has outpaced HPA in the upper price tiers.
  • YoY HPA varied significantly among the 60 largest metros. It ranged from -5.8% in San Jose (negative 12.9% when inflation adjusted) to 17.8% in Miami.
  • National Month-over-Month (MoM) HPA in November was -0.9%, and it is expected to keep declining in December and January based on the Optimal Blue data.
    • The West and the high price tier are showing the greatest amount of cooling.
  • Months’ supply continues to be extremely tight across the nation and all price tiers. Months’ supply stood at 2.5 months in November 2022, down from the pre-pandemic level of 3.0 months in November 2019, but up from 2.1 months in October 2022 and a trough of 0.9 months in May 2022.
  • November 2022 overall inventory was up 47% from a year ago but was still at only half of the 2017-2019 levels.

Full Report

To view more data on HPA and months supply, please visit our interactive.

PDF to full report

AUTHORS

Tobias Peter

Research Fellow and Assistant Director, AEI Housing Center.

Edward J. Pinto

Senior Fellow and Director, AEI Housing Center.

EDITORS NOTE: This American Enterprise Institute report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

‘Our Country Is Under Invasion’: Trump Calls To Halt Amnesty And The Release Of Migrants In 2024 Policy Video

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Former President Donald Trump called to halt amnesty and the release of migrants into the U.S. in a 2024 presidential campaign video Wednesday.

The former president lamented the border crisis as border agents have grown increasingly overwhelmed by the rising number of migrants. Migrant apprehension numbers exceeded 2.3 million and have reached record-high levels in the first two months of the 2023 fiscal year.

“Far more illegal immigrants have entered into the United States in the last two years than in any time in American history and by a massive margin,” Trump said. “We’ve never seen anything like it. Our country is under invasion. Days ago, 16,000 illegal aliens were encountered crossing the border in a single 48 hour period. A colossal migrant caravan recently poured across the Rio Grande and into the streets of El Paso, Texas, and the people and the police didn’t know what to do about it.”

“It is truly a massive invasion. Any form of amnesty now would be a catastrophe,” he continued. “It rewards Joe Biden’s lawlessness and it rewards the criminal cartels and it rewards everyone who has broken the laws of our nation because they’ve never done anything to our country like they’re doing right now. Our country is being poisoned.”

Trump accused President Joe Biden of tearing the immigration system into “shreds,” and warned that handing the current administration more resources will allow for more migrant releases. He urged for a “total ban” on releasing illegal immigrants.

“Biden inherited a flawless deportation system that was working like never before in our history. We never did so well on the border as we were doing just a short time ago under the Trump administration. Giving Biden more resources will simply translate to even more releases because that’s really what they have in mind. This has nothing to do with asylum. Everyone knows this is a pretext and this is a fraud. Anyone who pretends otherwise is playing into the hands of Biden and the criminal cartels.”

“This is about Biden’s lawless and criminal misconduct. The most important reform needed right now is a total ban on Biden using taxpayer dollars to free illegal aliens and criminal penalties for administrative, non-compliance which happens every single minute of every single day.”

Migrant apprehensions numbers nearly quadrupled from Trump’s final year in office to the time Biden assumed office in 2021. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) recorded 458,088 migrants in 2020, and then apprehended 1,734,686 in 2021, according to the agency’s data.

The Biden administration continued enforcing some Trump-era immigration policies, despite its criticism of the former president. Title 42, the Trump-era immigration policy used to mitigate COVID-19, was set to expire Wednesday to comply with a November court order ruling that it denied migrants from the ability to seek asylum. The Supreme Court temporarily halted the expiration in a Monday ruling after 19 states filed an emergency appeal.

The administration scrapped the Trump-era policy, “Remain In Mexico,” which required migrants to await their U.S. immigration court hearings in Mexico. The Supreme Court reinstated the policy in an August 24, 2021, ruling after the attorneys general in Texas and Missouri sued the administration with claims that the policy was unlawfully halted.

AUTHOR

NICOLE SILVERIO

Media reporter. Follow Nicole Silverio on Twitter @NicoleMSilverio

RELATED VIDEO: Tucker Carlson Hammers Congress For ‘Fawning’ Over Zelenskyy While The ‘American Border Collapses Completely’

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

‘Confusion’: Trump-Era Border Policy’s Uncertain Fate Is Only Worsening Illegal Immigration

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The number of illegal immigrant crossings is surging at the southern border as the fate of a major Trump-era immigration order known as Title 42 remains uncertain.

A federal judge recently ruled that the Biden administration must end the policy, which former President Donald Trump invoked in 2020 to expel certain illegal immigrants to prevent the spread of COVID-19, on Dec. 21 before Republican states asked the Supreme Court to intervene, which resulted with a temporary pause on the order. Areas like El Paso, Texas and Yuma, Arizona, have seen surges that have overwhelmed local resources surrounding the previous Dec. 21 deadline even as some illegal immigrants continue to face expulsion.

In Yuma, Arizona, Mayor Douglas Nicholls says a recent surge in illegal immigration will lead to the release of migrants onto the town’s streets. Yuma County Supervisor Jonathan Lines says the surge coincides with “confusion” over when Title 42 ends.

“There is so much confusion from the illegals coming across the border regarding Title 42 , numbers continue to climb as many believe they will be granted permission to stay. The President must address the open border and the consequences of illegals pouring into our communities overwhelming the Hospitals and NGOs. If DHS proceeds with street releases the burdens will be placed on the already strained resources of local cities. This is not sustainable,” Lines told the DCNF.

Federal border authorities in El Paso have moved roughly 10,000 illegal immigrants that crossed into the area recently, as many released from custody were sleeping on city sidewalks and on the floors of the local airport.

Migrant encounters at the southern border typically decrease at this time of year. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) encountered over 45,000 migrants at the southern border in October 2019, over 71,000 in October 2020 and over 164,000 in October 2021.

CBP encountered a record of more than 230,000 migrants in October 2022.

As of publication, CBP hasn’t officially released encounter numbers for November 2022. However, the National Border Patrol Council (NBPC) says border agents arrested more than 209,000 illegal immigrants during that time period.

The encounters during that time period are up from more than 174,000 across CBP in November 2021, more than 72,000 in November 2020 and more than 42,000 in November 2019.

AUTHOR

JENNIE TAER

Investigative reporter.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

‘An Indefensible Assault’: Conservatives Call for Halt to Omnibus

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As an impending snowstorm in the Washington, D.C. area and Senate Democrats put mounting pressure on Congress to push through a last-minute 4,155-page, $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill before the Friday deadline and Christmas recess, conservative lawmakers are voicing strong opposition to the measure, citing irresponsible delays and reckless spending on progressive special interest projects.

“These people, I would not put [them] in charge of a Minute Mart and three gas stations, much less a $6 trillion economy,” said Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.). “They know the deadlines, they fail every year. They bring it to Christmas and then they blame conservatives.”

Rep. Dan Bishop (R-N.C.) took to Twitter to lambast the bill in a series of tweets. “This omnibus spending bill is the worst of business as usual in Washington and is an indefensible assault on the American people. We will not abide it,” he said. The congressman pointed to a host of inclusions he deemed wasteful, including “$982k for motel vouchers in LA”; “$817k for partnerships with ‘justice-involved individuals’ in Glendale, CA”; “$2 million for ‘improving coordination’ in the NYC Mayor’s office”; “$8.6 million for ‘gender advisor programs’” at the Pentagon; “$65 million for salmon”; and “$3 million for bee-friendly highways,” among other controversial insertions.

Other GOP lawmakers, including Reps. Mary Miller (R-Ill.) and Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) as well as Senator Mike Braun (R-Ind.) slammed a provision for $3.6 million to be spent on a “Michelle Obama Trail.”

Multiple earmarks amounting to millions of dollars have also been designated for LGBT-themed special interest projects, along with millions more allocated for “diversity, equity, and inclusion”-themed ventures.

Still, despite the multitude of progressive priorities embedded in the spending bill, pro-abortion groups like NARAL, Planned Parenthood, and others expressed dismay Tuesday that it did not include specific new funding for abortion. “At a time of great crisis for reproductive health in this country, Congress has again utterly failed to safeguard access to the birth control and sexual health services made possible by the nation’s family planning program,” said Clare Coleman, president of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association.

Family Research Council, however, has argued that language is included in the omnibus that paves the way for abortion expansion. On Tuesday, FRC sent a letter to senators informing them that the organization would score against the bill for a variety of reasons, including language that “seems intent on making clear that VA [Veterans Affairs] facilities need to upgrade to be ready for an influx of abortions by female veterans and their families. The Omnibus should not be a vehicle for the Biden administration’s abortion expansion priorities.”

The letter went on to note that a section of the omnibus dedicated to funding for future pandemic response includes “grant programs that use vague, undefined terms such as ‘health equities,’ leaving the door open for Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers to gain access to taxpayer dollars.” The letter included the example of the city of Rochester, N.Y. recently setting aside a “$5 million grant of federal COVID-19 relief funding for Planned Parenthood for being an ‘anti-violence organization.’”

Connor Semelsberger, FRC’s director of Federal Affairs for Life and Human Dignity, underscored that final passage of the omnibus is in the hands of the GOP, which has the choice to delay passage of the spending bill until next January when Republicans will control the House.

“Senate Republicans really control the cards,” he explained on Tuesday’s edition of “Washington Watch.” “No piece of legislation can get through the U.S. Congress without bipartisan support thanks to the filibuster. And so, the Republicans really could band together [and] help their friends out over in the House to set them up for a good spending opportunity [that is in] their own interests next year.”

AUTHOR

Dan Hart

Dan Hart is senior editor at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This The Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Here’s The List of Sleazebag Republicans Who Betrayed Us and Voted For Obscene Omnibus

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The Senate agreed to the motion to proceed to the obscene omnibus 70-25. Here are the craven quislings in the GOP who voted for this corrupt, crippling crushing debt.

GOP in favor:

Roy Blunt, Missouri
John Boozman, Arkansas
Shelley Capito, West Virginia
Susan Collins, Maine
John Cornyn, Texas
Tom Cotton, Arkansas
Lindsey Graham, South Carolina
Chuck Grassley, Iowa
Cindy Hyde-Smith, Mississippi
Mitch McConnell, Kentucky
Jerry Moran, Kansas
Lisa Murkowski, Alaska
Rob Portman, Ohio
Mitt Romney, Utah
Mike Rounds, South Dakota
Richard Shelby, Alabama
John Thune, South Dak0ta
Tommy Tuberville, Alabama
Roger Wicker, Mississippi
Todd Young, Indiana

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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Massive Omnibus Bill Earmarks DOJ Money To Prosecute Pro-Lifers

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EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Fed-Surrection: Emails, Texts Show Pelosi Office Directly Involved in Failed Jan. 6 Security

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“House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office was directly involved in the creation and editing of the Capitol security plan that failed during the Jan. 6, 2021 riot and that security officials later declared they had been ‘denied again and again’ the resources needed …” — REPORT OF INVESTIGATION: Security Failures at the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021

It was a set-up. A coup. All suppressed by the Jan 6th kangaroo court. And lest we forget, Pelosi’s film crew she employed to be there.

House GOP locates emails, texts showing Pelosi office directly involved in failed Jan. 6 security

Democrat leadership blamed for “knee-jerk reaction” and failing to equip police in security staffer’s email after tragedy.

By John Solomon, Just The News, December 21, 2022:

House Republicans have gathered a trove of text and email messages revealing that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office was directly involved in the creation and editing of the Capitol security plan that failed during the Jan. 6, 2021 riot and that security officials later declared they had been “denied again and again” the resources needed to protect one of the nation’s most important homes of democracy.

The internal communications were made public Wednesday in a report compiled by Republican Reps. Rodney Davis, Jim Banks, Troy Nehls, Jim Jordan and Kelly Armstrong that encompasses the results of months of investigation they did of evidence that had been ignored by the Democrat-led Jan. 6 committee. The lawmakers were authorized by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy to do their own probe.

The report concludes the Capitol was left vulnerable on Jan. 6 as a result of failures by the Democratic leadership in the House and law enforcement leaders in the Capitol Police who allowed concerns about the “optics” of having armed officers and National Guardsmen visible to the public to override the need for enhanced security.

“Leadership and law enforcement failures within the U.S. Capitol left the complex vulnerable on January 6, 2021,” the report concluded. “The Democrat-led investigation in the House of Representatives, however, has disregarded those institutional failings that exposed the Capitol to violence that day.”

The report corroborated prior reporting by Just the News that Capitol Police began receiving specific warnings in mid-December that there could be significant violence planned against the Capitol and lawmakers by protesters planning to attend the certification of the 2020 election results.

“Prior to that day, the U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) had obtained sufficient information from an array of channels to anticipate and prepare for the violence that occurred,” the report determined.

You can read the full report here:

FINAL Report of Investigation.pdf

Banks said the GOP report helps counter a Democrat narrative that ignored security failures by police and political leadership.

“Our report exposes the partisanship, incompetence and indifference that led to the disaster on January 6 and it the leading role Speaker Pelosi and her office played in the security failure at the Capitol,” he said. “Unlike the sham January 6th Committee, House Republicans produced a useful report that will keep our Capitol and USCP officers safe with no subpoena power and no budget.”

Capitol Police said Wednesday they have been working to address the many failures the GOP report and other investigations have brought to light.

“For nearly two years our officers, officials and civilian employees have been working around the clock to address many of these findings and similar findings from a series of post January 6 reviews,” the department said in a statement. “We value everyone’s input and we are confident the U.S. Capitol complex is more secure because of the hard work of our brave men and women and because of the resources provided by the Congress to turn recommendations into results.”

But even as the department made the pledge to fix things, new failures were being unmasked. In an interview with CNN, Capitol Police Chief Thomas Manger acknowledged his department hadn’t checked security at Pelosi’s home for four years before the attack earlier this fall on her husband. He vowed his department would do a better job dealing with the growing threats of violence against lawmakers.

“Our responsibility is we’ve just got to deal with the growing number,” he said.

The report does not sugarcoat the behavior of pro-Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol.

“On January 6, 2021, criminal rioters assaulted police officers, broke into the U.S. Capitol, damaged property, and temporarily interfered with the certification of states’ presidential and vice presidential electors at the Joint Session of Congress — a typically pro forma event,” it noted.

But its most explosive revelations involved text and email messages showing that two key staffers in Pelosi’s office attended regular meetings to discuss the security plan for Jan. 6 dating back to early December 2020 and that Pelosi’s top aide even edited some of the plans. Most of those discussions and meetings excluded Republican lawmakers in the House, the report noted.

“Then-House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving — who served on the Capitol Police Board by virtue of his position — succumbed to political pressures from the Office of Speaker Pelosi and House Democrat leadership leading up to January 6, 2021,” the report said. “He coordinated closely with the Speaker and her staff and left Republicans out of important discussions related to security.”

After Pelosi forced Irving to resign following the devastating events of Jan. 6, a staffer in the House Sergeant at Arms office sent a stinging email suggesting the Democratic leadership had made Irving and Capitol Police Chief Steve Sund the fall guys to cover up the failure of lawmakers to provided adequate security resources.

“For the Speaker’s knee-jerk reaction to yesterday’s unprecedented event (and God knows how Congress lives for its knee-jerk reactions and to hell with future consequences … ). to immediately call for your resignation . . . after you have been denied again and again by Appropriations for proper security outfitting of the Capitol (and I WROTE several of those testimonies, dangit) … and to blame you personally because our department was doing the best they could with what they had and our comparatively small department size and limited officer resources … and because other agencies stepped in to assist just a fraction too late … again, for Congress to demand your resignation is spectacularly unjust, unfair, and unwarranted,” the staffer wrote Irving, according to the email included in the report.

“This is not your fault. Or Sund’s fault. If anything, Appropriations should be hung out to dry,” the staffer added.

The GOP report directly challenges the story Pelosi gave in February 2021 that she had “no power” over Capitol Police or the security plan for Jan. 6. “Documents provided by the House Sergeant at Arms show how then-House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving carried out his duties in clear deference to the Speaker, her staff, and other Democratic staff,” it said.

It noted that Pelosi’s chief of staff Terri McCullough and another aide assigned to Pelosi’s staff, Jamie Fleet, had regular contact with police and the sergeant at arms over the security planning for Jan. 6 starting in early December 2020. At one point, McCullough was so involved she was asked to edit a security plan letter that was going to lawmakers a few days ahead of the tragic events.

“Irving sent the draft to McCullough and Fleet and requested any edits comments or concerns,” the report said “McCullough responded shortly afterwards with edits.”

The report faults Irving for being distracted by other responsibilities and a top intelligence official for the Capitol Police for making changes to intelligence analysis that kept frontline officers from knowing the dangers they were about to face that day.

“Officers on the front lines and analysts in USCP’s intelligence division were undermined by the misplaced priorities of their leadership,” the report said. “Those problems were exacerbated by the House Sergeant at Arms, who was distracted from giving full attention to the threat environment prior to January 6, 2021 by several other upcoming events.”

Keep reading…..

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

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Pelosi Congress Claims Sovereign Immunity in Federal Court to Keep Secret January 6 Videos and Emails

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WATCH Sen. Frank Church’s Stark Warning Of Intel Agencies Capability to Impose “Total Tyranny” In America on NBC’s Meet the Press 1975

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

‘Attempting To Discredit The Agency’: FBI Responds To ‘Twitter Files’

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The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) issued a new statement Wednesday following the latest “Twitter Files” dump.

The FBI accused the “Twitter Files” release as an attempt “to discredit” the agency by disclosing information on the FBI’s correspondence with Twitter in October 2020. Journalist Matt Taibbi revealed that the agency warned the previous executives at Twitter of a “hack-and-leak” by “state actors” surrounding the story of Hunter Biden’s laptop to influence the 2020 presidential election.

“The correspondence between the FBI and Twitter show nothing more than examples of our traditional, longstanding and ongoing federal government and private sector engagements, which involve numerous companies over multiple sectors and industries. As evidenced in the correspondence, the FBI provides critical information to the private sector in an effort to allow them to protect themselves and their customers. The men and women of the FBI work every day to protect the American public,” the statement began.

“It is unfortunate that conspiracy theorists and others are feeding the American public misinformation with the sole purpose of attempting to discredit the agency,” the agency concluded.

The “Twitter Files” revealed that the FBI and Twitter worked closely in the lead up to the 2020 presidential election. Internal documents published Monday found that the FBI paid Twitter nearly $3.5 million between October 2019 and February 2021 for managing its financial burdens caused while complying with the agency’s requests.

Taibbi reported he found no evidence that the FBI had involvement in Twitter’s suppression of the New York Post’s report on Hunter Biden’s laptop, though new reports released by author Michael Shellenberger indicated they may have, in fact, been involved.

Former FBI Deputy General Counsel James Baker argued Twitter’s then-head of trust and safety Yoel Roth’s claim that the Post’s report did not violate the social media site’s policies on October 14, according to Shellenberger. The agency had already been in possession of Biden’s laptop since December 2019, indicating that the agency knew the Post reported the story accurately.

Musk announced Dec. 6 that he fired Baker for allegedly withholding the release of documents related to the suppression of Biden’s laptop.

The agency also flagged certain tweets for Twitter to remove from the platform, the files found. Some agents were even employed at the social media company.

Republican Kentucky Rep. James Comer, the incoming House Oversight Chair, said Tuesday that Congress should block funding of the FBI until it disclosed the alleged involvement in Big Tech censorship.

“In the beginning, I thought that there were probably two or three rogue employees who were orchestrating this cover up of the Hunter Biden laptop story, but now we know the FBI had a division of at least 80 agents,” Comer said. “We also know that the FBI paid Twitter over $3 million for their time, all the time they took over the past couple of years in telling them who to suppress, who to ban. You know, it’s just things that the government has no role in.”

“The FBI was never granted the authority to create any type of disinformation task force that policed the social media sites. Now this we know with Twitter,” he continued. “We’ve heard similar stories from Zuckerberg. Who knows what went on at YouTube and Google. This is an agency that’s out of control.”

AUTHOR

NICOLE SILVERIO

Media reporter. Follow Nicole Silverio on Twitter @NicoleMSilverio

RELATED ARTICLE: Twitter Gave ‘Special Protection’ To Pentagon Propaganda Accounts, Docs Show

RELATED VIDEO: Miranda Devine: The FBI Was Paying Twitter $3.4 Million ‘to Help Censor Americans’

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EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Removal of Criminal Illegal Immigrants Arrested by Local Police Drops 71% Under Biden

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Besides smashing a record for apprehending a ghastly 2.4 million illegal immigrants along the Mexican border last year, the Biden administration is also making history for drastically slashing the number of criminal aliens that get deported. In its first nine months the administration removed 71% fewer criminal aliens arrested by local police compared to a comparable period in 2019 under President Donald Trump. Overall deportations also declined under Biden from 186,000 in fiscal year 2020 to 59,000 the following year, according to government data provided to the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The Washington D.C.-based nonprofit is the nation’s only think tank devoted exclusively to the research of U.S. immigration policy and has issued a multitude of informative reports over the years.

This month the nonpartisan group published the findings of its analysis of state and local statistics involving illegal aliens removed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in fiscal years 2019 through 2021. The records include migrants identified by ICE with a biometric match under the Secure Communities program, which uses a federal information-sharing partnership between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to identify aliens in custody without imposing additional requirements on state and local law enforcement. ICE uses fingerprint matching to flag illegal immigrants arrested by local police for state crimes and the agency removes individuals who present significant threats to public safety as determined by the severity of their crime and criminal history, according to ICE’s Secure Communities website. The agency stresses that “the federal government, not the state or local law enforcement agency, determines what immigration enforcement action, if any, is appropriate.”

Under Biden the number has nose-dived. Besides the 71% drop in removals of deportable aliens that came to ICE’s attention after a local criminal arrest, deportations of convicted felons also fell 25% from 36,000 in fiscal year 2020 to 27,000 in fiscal year 2021. CIS found that 51 jurisdictions “experienced acute declines” with criminal removals dipping an unbelievable 90%. Ten states—Connecticut, Georgia, Idaho, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Vermont—saw an “extreme decline in enforcement” of over 80% under Biden, the CIS report says, adding that of the 50 American counties that typically have the highest criminal alien removals 14 experienced the extreme 80-plus percent drop under Biden. About a third of the “high-volume counties” are in Texas, according to the figures obtained by CIS. One of them, Howard County in the state’s western region, is singled out as an example of the public safety implications of the Biden enforcement policies. “It is reasonable to conclude from these statistics that under the Biden policies, ICE is knowingly taking a pass on removing most deportable criminal aliens who have come to their attention after arrest in Howard County, and even knowingly taking a pass on some of the deportable criminal aliens who were convicted of serious or violent crimes in Howard County,” CIS writes in its report. “As a result, Howard County likely is experiencing some degree of repeated crime from those criminal aliens who continue to offend and victimize community members after ICE declined to take action to remove them.”

Researchers at the immigration think tank conclude that the public safety consequences of the Biden interior enforcement policies experienced in Howard County are undoubtedly occurring in hundreds of other jurisdictions around the nation. “State and local authorities should keep track of cases of criminal aliens who are not removed by ICE and bring these cases to the attention of ICE leadership, members of Congress, and the public,” according to CIS. “In addition, through appropriations or otherwise, the new Congress should clarify its expectations with respect to immigration enforcement in the interior, particularly involving criminal aliens, certain of whom are subject to mandatory arrest and detention under the Immigration and Nationality Act.”

The distressing CIS report comes on the heels of a record-breaking year for illegal immigration along the southern border. Besides arresting 2.4 million migrants in fiscal year 2022 (up from 1.73 million in 2021), Border Patrol agents apprehended hundreds of gang members—mostly from the famously violent Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13)—and dozens of people on the national terrorist watchlist. Federal agents also confiscated thousands of pounds of drugs, mainly methamphetamine.

EDITORS NOTE: This Judicial Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Hackers Tied to China’s Government Steal $20 Mil in U.S. COVID Relief Funds

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Nearly a year after Judicial Watch launched an investigation into the theft of U.S. COVID relief funds by foreign hackers, the Secret Service confirms that cyber criminals connected to China’s government stole $20 million in benefits. This includes Small Business Administration (SBA) loans and unemployment insurance money in multiple states, according to a national news story that identifies the perpetrators as a APT41, a hacking group based in Chengdu. The report cites U.S. law enforcement officials and cybersecurity experts who believe the multi-million-dollar theft of government pandemic funds by the Chinese faction “may just be the tip of the iceberg.”

Back in February Judicial Watch filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the SBA as part of an ongoing investigation into the pervasive fraud associated with the government’s COVID-19 cash giveaway. Specifically, Judicial Watch requested memoranda, reports, email communications, investigative reports, and other communications or data concerning the following: COVID-19 Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) deposits originating from a foreign Internet Protocol (IP) address, account holders attempting to transfer funds to foreign accounts of any type and loans approved utilizing a fraudulent social security number. On February 23, the SBA acknowledged via electronic mail that it received Judicial Watch’s FOIA request and issued an official tracking number. So far no records have been provided to Judicial Watch and the SBA is in violation of the federal deadline—20 working days—to produce the information.

Most government agencies practice similar stonewalling tactics and Judicial Watch has repeatedly been forced to file lawsuits to compel the release of records. Our goal as a nonpartisan educational foundation is to promote transparency, accountability and integrity in government, politics, and the law. Pandemic relief has been a colossal multi-billion-dollar debacle rife with fraud and corruption. The problem is so bad that the Department of Justice (DOJ) created a COVID-19 Fraud Enforcement Task Force to “enhance efforts to combat and prevent pandemic-related fraud.” The special unit has been quite busy prosecuting a multitude of scams, false statements, and money laundering related to pandemic relief. Earlier this year House Republicans issued a report documenting 500 days of massive waste, fraud, and abuse in the American Rescue Plan. It includes more than $783 million in stimulus checks for convicted prisoners including the Boston Marathon bomber, $40 million to expand libraries in Delaware, $2 million for a Florida golf course and $16 million for electric vehicle charging stations in Maine and $20 million to modernize the state’s fish hatcheries. The list goes on and on.

The SBA got on Judicial Watch’s radar because it has disbursed approximately $390 billion to nearly four million small businesses and nonprofits under its COVID-19 EIDL. The program provides up to $2 million in financial assistance to help small businesses recover from the economic impacts of the pandemic. Like many of the other COVID relief initiatives, the government made it way too easy to obtain cash and failed miserably to implement adequate vetting protocols. Officials cited in the recent news article confirm that other federal investigations of pandemic fraud also seem to point back to foreign state-affiliated hackers. The Secret Service admits there are over 1,000 ongoing investigations involving transnational and domestic criminals defrauding public benefits programs and Chinese hackers are key among them. As if it were not serious enough that Chinese hacks are stealing American taxpayer funds, one senior Justice Department official points out the cybercrimes also have serious national security implications.

Besides the SBA’s EIDL, the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act, passed by Congress to provide over $2 trillion in “fast and direct economic aid” to Americans negatively impacted by the pandemic, also launched another fraud-infested initiative known as the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). In addition to the DOJ’s special task force, federal prosecutors across the nation have charged dozens of individuals with crimes associated with PPP scams. A recent example includes a father and son convicted of illegally obtaining $1.7 in loans. A federal jury in North Carolina convicted the men of money laundering and other offenses with the father sentenced to four years in prison and the son three years. This month the top federal prosecutor in the Eastern District of Virginia revealed that in 2022 her office has charged more than 50 defendants in 26 cases of fraud schemes connected to COVID relief that defrauded the government out of nearly $125 million.

EDITORS NOTE: This Judicial Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

President Trump reacts to Twitter Files: Musk is a ‘hero’

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In his first interview since the release of The Twitter Files, 45th President Donald Trump spoke with OAN’s Chief White House Correspondent Chanel Rion. Here’s part of that discussion as well as Trump’s reaction to Elon Musk’s Twitter Files release.

©One America News Network. All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLE: Elon Musk Sticking By His Word

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