Uninformed savants across the political spectrum have pilloried President Trump for his eminently rational decision to draw down the U.S. troop commitment (initially, only 25, as it turns out!) to the Syrian morass (whose “dynamic” has remained largely unchanged since the late 1940s).
Most of the ire directed at Mr. Trump has to do with hand-wringing over our “Kurdish allies,” even after the President warned Turkey not to engage in its habitual behaviors — since Ataturk created his ethno-racist state — towards the Kurds. Regardless, here are a few salient points one should bear in mind about the Kurds which the hand-wringers conveniently ignore in their hagiographies:
Kurdish predatory mass killings of Christians and Yazidis are well-characterized and went on for centuries. Grinding persecution continues to this day, as can be gleaned from detailed reports by both Assyrian and Yazidi organizations (here; here; here)
Kurdish “region(s)” were ethnically cleansed of Jews by the late 19th/early 20th centuries in a series a pogroms, compounded by constant grinding persecution including enslavement of Jewish families handed over between generations of Kurds as “family property” (p. 658; p. 108)
The Kurds of Turkey, brutally oppressed (here) by Ataturk’s ugly ethno-racist Turkish supremacist state (here), since the 1920s, ongoing, evolved their own brutal (here) Marxist terror organization, the PKK, to combat this oppression. Those Marxist PKK elements are the fighting backbone of the Syrian Kurds whom the U.S. is now claimed to be “abandoning”
Kurds of Iraqi “Kurdistan” have enshrined the Sharia (“This Constitution confirms and respects the Islamic identity of the majority of the people of Iraqi Kurdistan. It considers the principles of Islamic Sharia as one of the main sources of legislation… It is not allowed to enact a law inconsistent with the provisions of the fundamentals of Islam,” Articles 6 & 7) and even apply it to Kurdish conscientious objectors to Islam who escape their Kurdish Muslim paradise and flee to the West. (here; here)
Johny Messo is head of the World Council of Arameans. In 2014 Messo issued this statement when Israel’s Minister of Interior, H.E. Gideon Sa‘ar, signed a document that recognizes “Aramean” as a distinct national identity in Israel’s population registry:
We greatly commend Israel for being the first state in the world to recognize our people in keeping with international law. This fantastic news has had a major impact on the global Aramean population. It encourages us to continue our legal struggle for recognition by our home countries of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon”
Messo, was quoted from this story published today (10/10/19) from about the depredations and duplicity of the Kurdish Marxist brigades operating within Northern Syria:
“The PYD/YPG is threatening Syriacs and still forcibly detaining some children to join them,” Johny Messo, head of the World Council of Arameans (Syriacs), told Anadolu Agency on Thursday. Telling how the terrorist PYD/YPG fought other terrorist groups only to pursue its own territorial aims, he explained: “The aim of the PYD/YPG in its struggle against Daesh was to seize their territories and integrate them as part of the autonomous Kurdish region envisaged by them.” The U.S. had enlisted the PYD/YPG to fight Daesh, while Turkey objected that using one terror group to fight another makes no sense. Messo said the PYD/YPG and Daesh are both terror groups, differing only in aims, and sometimes even working together. “For example, the BBC showed that the PYD/YPG signed an agreement with Daesh. And, according to our own sources, the PYD/YPG took former Daesh members with them,” he added. Messo said it is the PYD/YPG — the Syrian branch of the [MARXIST] terrorist PKK….
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Jihad Watchhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngJihad Watch2019-10-11 06:57:482019-10-12 05:27:50Don’t Romanticize the Kurds by Andrew Bostom
As a leader of the radical feminist organization group Women’s Liberation Front, Natasha Chart doesn’t agree with conservatives on much. But when it comes to the transgender movement and protecting children from transgender ideology, she’s standing side by side with conservatives.
Plus, we take on the issue of deepfakes—the technology that enables you to transpose one person’s face over another’s, making it seem like that person is doing or saying something they are not—and how it’s becoming a bigger problem, particularly for women.
We also address Teen Vogue’s claim that Gen Z is the most progressive and politically independent, Demi Lovato’s apology for taking a celebrity birthright trip to Israel, and the now-infamous courtroom hug between Brandt Jean and Amber Guyger, the police officer who had killed his older brother.
And we leave you with Ellen Degeneres’ special message about George W. Bush.
Lauren Evans: Virginia and I are back in studio today with Natasha Chart of the Women’s Liberation Front.
Natasha, thanks for joining us.
Natasha Chart: Hey. How’s it going, Lauren? Thanks for having me on.
Evans: So happy to have you. Natasha, can you tell our listeners a little bit about who you are and what you do at WLF?
Chart: Sure. I’m the board chair of the Women’s Liberation Front, also commonly referred to as WLF. We are an all-volunteer organization of radical feminists.
We formed up in order to challenge the Obama administration’s directive ending single-sex spaces in federally-funded educational institutions because we thought someone should challenge that in court, and no one else seemed to be stepping up to do it, so we did.
Virginia Allen: What is the type of work that WLF is now pursuing?
Chart: We’re still doing the same kind of legal advocacy. Many other suits have been brought over this issue, [so] our resources are scarce. We don’t have any paid staff at all, so we’ve been mainly filing amicus briefs, friend-of-the-court briefs in other cases to advance our ideas of how the law should be interpreted and work from a radical feminist perspective.
We’ve been de-platformed in the media. The progressive press tries to pretend that we absolutely don’t exist, to the extent that they can, although that’s becoming harder for them now.
One of our rationales was, “Well, you can’t de-platform us from the court.” You’re not going to protest the federal court and be like, “We can’t allow this brief in.” Then, they’ll say, “Oh, well, this brief is very problematic, and we will reject it on that ground.” They don’t do that. We’re like, “Well, if we can’t be heard anywhere else, we can be heard in court, like everybody else.” There you go.
Evans: That’s a great approach to take. Natasha, you brought up that women’s-only spaces is one of the motivating factors for your group. Can you explain to our listeners why women’s-only spaces are important?
Chart: In our view, one of the most important things to feminism as a practice, as a process issue, is that women are discouraged from expressing solidarity with each other, across all kinds of lines.
And as part of our work, that seams over and over again, and it’s just reinforced every time there’s some round of fighting or argument or discussion over some new factional split, to encourage women to try to relate to each other in solidarity, to stand with each other, and to say, “We may not have everything in common, but we can agree on this, and I’m going to support you.” Or, “Even if I don’t want to be part of what you’re doing, I’m not going to try to tear you down.”
That’s just the foundation of any successful political movement, where you have to bring in a lot of people, and you can’t just rely on the tiny number of people who agree with you. There’s never going to be some huge, vast majority that agrees with you. This is a nation of … roughly [330] million people. You’re never going to get everybody to say, “Oh, yes. We all agree on this one thing.”
You can’t even get dentists to all agree on sugared gum, as they say. You can’t get that. You have to work. Women are discouraged from having that kind of solidarity with each other, that’s common to every successful political movement. You have to cultivate that. That’s the biggest stumbling block. Encouraging women-only space, it’s not a high, complicated concept, but it has transformative properties.
Allen: Natasha, groups like the Women’s March typically end up intertwining feminism and transgender issues, but WLF takes a different stand. Why?
Chart: Because gender identity is about men saying that they’re women. To some extent now, you have more women saying, “Oh, well, I’m really not like the other girls. I am actually a man,” for a number of reasons. That strain of activism would not have had so much success if it wasn’t men insisting that they have the right to be treated, in all aspects of the law and society, as women.
This is not only impossible—if you’re someone who has a commitment to speaking the truth, and relying on the facts, it’s intellectually offensive. It’s also offensive to feminist principles, which is about women expressing solidarity with each other.
Here are these men coming in and saying, “We need to be at the center of your movement. We need to be at the center of your concern. We are the most oppressed, most vulnerable women.” It’s some white guy [who’s] a married dad, and he’s an executive at a bank. That is not the most vulnerable, oppressed woman in the world. I’m sorry. That’s just not true.
It’s not feminist, and we can’t support it. A lot of women on the left, like in the Women’s March, they will not be allowed to do the other work that they want to do at all on the left because all of the men on the left have decided to say to these other men, “Oh, well, if you want to dress like that, and if you want to call yourself that, well, I guess you’re not a real man after all.” Which is pretty sexist of them, frankly. “You go off and be with the women.” That’s not our problem. We didn’t come up with that.
If men are worried about how effeminate men are treated, men should deal with that. Apparently, everybody agrees that men’s bathrooms are some terribly scary violent place. I don’t know what those guys are doing in there. Seriously, sort yourselves out. That’s not women’s problem to deal with.
Or, they’ll bring up, “Oh, well, these feminine-presenting men are treated badly in men’s prisons.” A lot of men are treated badly in men’s prisons. Men who are gay, young men, someone who’s just not very physically as strong as the other guys. Maybe the real issue that needs to be addressed there is that men’s prisons are terribly unsafe. Deal with that problem for everybody.
That’s its own issue. It deserves its own strain of advocacy. It deserves its own people speaking up strongly who’ve been affected by it. Lumping it in by saying, “This is a women’s issue. Just put this section of men who are affected in the women’s prison.” That doesn’t address the problem. It just puts it off on women. That’s not fair.
Evans: Natasha, you have been very busy this week. You are speaking about the Harris Supreme Court case that was heard on Oct. 8, which is the case where an employee of a funeral home transitioned from a man to a woman, transitioned from identifying as a man to identifying as a woman. Because they would not wear the men’s dress code for the funeral home, the funeral director fired the employee. Now, the employee is suing him for discrimination.
Can you tell us what were you doing, what were you speaking about, and why this case is so important to you?
Chart: Part of what I was speaking about yesterday is the intimidation tactics that have been levied against women on the left, the sexual harassment, the firings.
It’s like so many of the people who were with the ACLU demonstration were like, “Well, LGBT people have the right to work.” I agree with this, that those folks have the right to fair employment and nondiscrimination, all of us.
I’m like, “Yeah, and I’m over here, as a bisexual woman, standing in solidarity with my lesbian sisters,” many of us who’ve been fired, sexually harassed, received death threats, etc., for just saying, “No, men can’t be women. That’s not a real thing.” Where’s our right to be employed, and to have our opinions?
The thing about the Harris case, is it’s been presented very dishonesty, and in some cases, by ACLU staff, as being about sex-based dress codes. That was never a question before the court. If you read through the documents, it says that. That’s not under issue.
There’s a line in the petitioner’s brief the ACLU wrote for Amy Stevens, the plaintiff, that is talking about how Stevens would have been fine following the women’s dress code. That’s at the heart of this. That sex-based dress codes weren’t the thing. It’s their insistence on presenting sex itself as a stereotype of sex, which you can’t have a stereotype of something that has no objective definition.
A stereotype has to refer, at base, a real thing in the world that has some material definition that we can all recognize and wrap our heads around. It’s about saying not that you’re discriminating against me because I’m a man, and I want to wear a dress to work, and men should be allowed to wear dresses at work. Totally different question. He’s saying, “I am a man, I have the right to be treated as a woman, under the rules for women.” That would reinterpret sex in all of federal law.
I believe that even in the oral arguments the justices teased out that if this challenge wins, suits on all of these other issues where there are sex-based distinctions would almost certainly follow, and quite rapidly.
Then, at some point, you can’t make any distinction in the law on sex. The law is forbidden basically to see sex at all and recognize it. That simply erases women’s rights.
We would still have the right to vote, I’m sure, but anything that would be there as a redress for centuries of discrimination is just wiped out. It’s no longer for women. It’s not a women’s team if there are men in it. Then, it’s a mixed-sex team. That’s what it is.
It’s not a women’s locker room if there are men in it. Then, it’s a coed locker room, and a lot of women are going to stay back from things like that, so they’re not subject to indecent exposure, voyeurism, or in the case sports, so they’re not subject to injury. They’ve made the women’s amateur rugby teams in the U.K. mixed-sex, basically on the grounds of gender identification.
There was a story just out in The Times U.K. about this last week, that the coaches are quitting because they’re worried about women getting their bones broken in rugby matches with these guys.
It’s a very aggressive, very physical sport, and they’re worried about physical injury. They’re just basically being told, “Well, it’s the equalities law. We can’t do anything about it.” … It’s not fair.
Allen: At WLF, and for you personally, how do you define who a woman is?
Chart: A woman is an adult human female—the dictionary definition that Posie Parker over in the U.K. has made infamous with her T-shirts, stickers, and billboard campaigns.
That definition has just become terribly controversial, where people are saying, “Well, this is violence and transphobic.” It’s like, “This is just what women are.” It’s a biologically determined objective fact that we observe about people. It’s not assigned, you see someone’s sex. You don’t interpret that.
[For] 99.98% of people, it’s blatantly obvious whether they are male or female at birth. It doesn’t take any kind of specialty training to find this out. That something so basic has been made offensive and unsayable has had this massive cascade of problems.
If you got to see the rally yesterday—just like in sports and employment law, all kinds of nondiscrimination law, in terms of whether or not you can say when you go to the doctor and you’re a woman, “I would like a woman to perform my exam,” or, “I would like a woman to chaperone my exam, if there’s only a male doctor available.”
Even something so basic to your bodily privacy and sense of safety as that is under question, and it’s all because there’s this one lie that has to be defended at all costs now. That lie is that people can change sex by an act of will. No matter how many laws you make saying that that’s possible, it’s just not possible.
Evans: Natasha, I want to—I guess transition is a bad word to use—but I want to switch topics. You spoke yesterday at [The Heritage Foundation], at the Summit on Protecting Children From Sexualization. What is your biggest concern when these gender identity issues not just affect adults, but they affect our children?
Chart: The most blatant problem with that is the physical impact on the children who are transitioned, which is that a lot of them are irreversibly and permanently losing all aspects of adult sexual function.
Some of these children, and pardon for the blunt language, but they will never be able to have an orgasm their entire life. They will never experience this because their sexual organs have been removed by the time they were of majority age to be able to make these kinds of decisions.
We saw the case of Jazz Jennings. The whole country saw that. You can say, “Well, it’s horrible to talk about a child like this.” I didn’t put that on television, this poor kid celebrating the physical removal of one’s healthy body parts. That’s the biggest impact.
I honestly don’t know why that wasn’t the moment where a whole bunch of people watching that show, and patting themselves on the back for being inclusive, didn’t stop and think to themselves, “Hey, wait a minute. What’s going on here? What are we celebrating here? What if that was my kid celebrating a really serious operation like that to themselves, a cosmetic procedure?”
I feel like it’s a huge lack of empathy, that again, society will see a boy who maybe acts in a way that we consider effeminate, and like, “Well, it doesn’t matter what happens to him. I guess he’s not a real boy. He’s not a real man. Whatever happens to his body, we don’t care.” I don’t understand why that didn’t stop it.
The other problem is that these kids are being presented as having the adult capacity and agency to be able to make decisions like that. That is very much in contradiction to, for instance, a lot of the advocacy groups that used to speak to me, but now will no longer do so, would talk about the school-to-prison pipeline. One of the concepts that’s really important to that is that it dehumanizes children to present them as fully capable of making moral decisions on the same level as adults.
If you have a child, and this happens very often to black and brown children in the school system, where they do some stupid kid thing. Like most people, you remember back in your life, you did some kid thing, probably a lot of us. I know for sure, I look back and I think, “Oh my God, I’m so glad nobody saw that, and I didn’t have to face consequences as an adult for that because that was really dumb, and I didn’t understand.”
Most of us had the grace from society for the adults around us to be like, “Kid, you messed up. Let me tell you about it. Let’s work on it. Let’s not do it again. … You’re still young enough to figure this out.”
These kids are having that protection entirely stripped away from them. They’re being allowed to make very serious decisions that they don’t understand, that they haven’t experienced, because they haven’t gone through puberty.
There are these girls who are being put through menopause before they’ve had puberty. … Menopause is physically awful, as many, many women can attest, although this is not a thing you talk about a lot. But putting a 14-year-old through it on purpose, she’s never gone through having all those feelings and developmental experiences that they’re unpleasant.
Nobody likes that. Nobody has a good time. Nobody looks back and thinks, “Oh, puberty. That was the best time of my life. I miss the acne. I miss the aching, and the weirdness, and the feeling awkward all the time, and not knowing where your arms and legs are because all of a sudden, they’re like 6 inches longer than they were last year.” You’re like, “Oh my God, what am I doing?”
Nobody liked that, but it’s important for your formation, as an adult person, to go through that, and to be protected from the consequences of just being that unsettled in yourself, and going through all of that with your peers.
These children are being denied that, and they’re being dehumanized by people treating them like adults too soon. My heart aches for these kids.
Allen: As Lauren mentioned, you spoke on the Summit on Protecting Children From Sexualization. That whole summit can be found on the Heritage Foundation YouTube page. I want to ask, how did WLF end up getting connected with The Heritage Foundation? Did you ever see yourself aligning so closely with conservatives?
Chart: Wow. Well, we’re part of the Hands Across the Aisle Coalition. It’s an informal discussion network of women from, like, every political perspective. There are liberal pagan goddess worshipers in there, and there are conservative Christians of almost every description. I would still consider myself politically, my personal ideas, I’m a fairly mainstream to progressive Democrat.
We’re all represented in there but there’s a woman whose child was convinced that they were the opposite sex, and has been pushing hard to take steps to transition. She tried for four years to get someone, anyone, to please talk about this issue, and to raise it in public in a venue where policymakers and the media would start to understand that behind all this happy talk about inclusion and affirmation, there are real harms being done to real people.
There are physical injuries. There is destruction of family relationships going on. People’s hearts are breaking, and they feel like they can’t speak out at all.
She tried for so long. The only people who answered her, and were willing to give her a platform to talk about this, were the folks here at Heritage.
She invited us to come because we were all getting all of this flack already for being public about opposing gender identity under our own names. She asked if we could help supply speakers because the parents of these children can’t come out and talk. They can’t say this stuff.
For one thing, they have concerns about their children’s medical privacy. … Some of the parents came to the summit, and were talking with us before that. One couple was talking about how they felt they couldn’t talk to anyone in their church. Or, how they feel ostracized, and they have to hide things from people in local political groups, where they had once felt very welcome.
This issue has made them feel entirely cut off from their communities, and they’re afraid of significant public ostracism, of being cut off from other networks. They asked us to give voice to this.
The beginning of that panel is my colleague on the board, Jennifer Chavez, reading a number of parents’ stories, parents who could not come out and do that themselves.
That was how that happened. I wouldn’t have predicted that that would have happened five years ago. I probably would have said a number of terribly unpleasant and uncollegial things about the idea of even walking in the door here, but here we are.
Evans: We’re glad that you’re here.
Chart: Thank you.
Evans: I do want to plug … a short documentary [we did] on Hands Across the Aisle, and I did get to meet a lot of your members. It was just a incredible experience. I’ll make sure to put that documentary in the show notes, if any of our listeners want to learn more about the group.
Natasha, we ask pretty much all of our guests this question: [Do] you identify as a feminist? … I imagine you would, so I’m going to change the question a little bit, why is identifying as a feminist so important to you?
Chart: It’s because of … what I was saying at first about solidarity with other women, there are certain policy positions that I do think are at the heart of feminism in an outward way. Primarily, it’s about standing up to say, “I am a woman who puts other women first, to whatever extent that I can, wherever I can.”
I do get people asking, “How can you be a feminist and talk at The Heritage Foundation?” It’s like, “Well, I am a feminist. If I show up at The Heritage Foundation, I’m going to do whatever I can while I’m there to be putting women first in whatever way makes sense, in whatever way I can advance those interests that are common to all of us. That’s just what I’m going to do, wherever I am.”
The women in Iran are working on, “How can we be allowed to go out in public without having to wear religious headgear?”
Women in Saudi Arabia are working on, “How do we have the right just to be in public at all, on our own recognizance, as adult citizens?”
Women in the U.S., there are women alive today who remember when they could not get a line of credit in their own name, when they wouldn’t have been allowed to buy a house, when most colleges were closed to them, when most professions were closed to them entirely.
You just work on whatever makes sense at the time, with the resources you can. That goal is always women acting in solidarity with other women. There are women everywhere, so you can be a feminist everywhere that you are.
Evans: Natasha, we really appreciate your time, and that you joined us on the podcast today. Thank you so much.
Chart: Thank you so much for inviting me. It’s been a delight. Take care.
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 Signal2019-10-10 05:02:442019-10-11 06:18:01PODCAST: The Radical Feminists Who Are Fighting the Transgender Movement
Does an impeachment inquiry require a vote of the full House of Representatives? President Donald Trump and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., maintain that it does. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., claims that it doesn’t.
Pelosi is correct that the Constitution doesn’t explicitly require it. It simply gives the House the “sole Power of Impeachment.” But the gravity of even considering impeachment, fundamental principles of fair and impartial justice, and preserving our republican form of government, do require it.
Pelosi alone announced on Sept. 25 that the House was opening an impeachment inquiry, directing six different committees to investigate the president. This is radically different, and much more partisan, than how this serious step was taken in the past.
In 1974, like today, a Republican was in the White House and Democrats controlled the House. On Feb. 6, the full House voted 410-4 to authorize an impeachment investigation of President Richard Nixon by the Judiciary Committee. Similarly, on Oct. 8, 1998, the full House voted 258-176 for the Judiciary Committee to open an impeachment investigation of President Bill Clinton.
Pelosi’s claim that there is no “House precedent that the whole House vote before proceeding with an impeachment inquiry,” therefore, is simply false.
Other than declaring war, there is no more serious undertaking by the House of Representatives in our constitutional republic. Why? Because through impeachment, the House is charging a president with misconduct so serious that he should immediately be removed from office. In other words, the House is effectively seeking to neutralize the choice—and the votes—of the American electorate.
That is an extraordinary action, especially in a system of government based on the people electing their own leaders. And it’s also the reason that impeachment alone cannot remove the president; that requires conviction by two-thirds of the Senate (67 senators). Neither of the presidents who were impeached—Andrew Johnson in 1868 and Bill Clinton in 1999—were convicted and, therefore, stayed in office.
In an Oct. 3 letter, McCarthy asked for a vote of the full House. He reminded Pelosi that the Judiciary Committee report on the Clinton impeachment investigation said:
“Because impeachment is delegated solely to the House of Representatives by the Constitution, the full House of Representatives should be involved in critical decision making regarding various stages of impeachment.”
An investigation to determine, in the words of the Clinton resolution, “whether sufficient grounds exist” for impeachment should be authorized by the body with the “sole Power of Impeachment”—the House of Representatives. Moreover, such a resolution should, as it did for the Clinton impeachment investigation, outline the rules under which it will be conducted.
McCarthy asked important questions that Pelosi’s announcement did not answer. Will the ranking minority member of the investigating committees have the authority to issue subpoenas and to question witnesses, or simply be ignored by the majority? Will the president’s lawyers be able to attend all hearings and depositions; to present evidence; to object to the admittance of evidence; to cross-examine witnesses; or to recommend witnesses to be interviewed?
As McCarthy says, if Pelosi says “no” to these questions, then she will be “denying the president the bare minimum rights granted to his predecessors.” Doing so would indicate that Pelosi and these committees do not intend to provide the fundamental due process rights we extend even to those accused of wrongdoing in our courts.
All Americans have an interest in the integrity of our government and the legitimacy of its actions. Departing from precedent; single-handed directives; freewheeling roving investigations by multiple committees; and running roughshod over the minority undermine that interest.
On the other hand, that interest is served by the entire House considering and authorizing an impeachment inquiry; a transparent investigation; authority for both the majority and minority committee members to investigate, subpoena, and call witnesses; and outlining the scope of the investigation.
America’s Founders did not put impeachment into the Constitution as a partisan tool to be used for overturning an election. How this process is conducted today will reveal who in the House of Representatives agrees with them.
Hans von Spakovsky is an authority on a wide range of issues—including civil rights, civil justice, the First Amendment, immigration, the rule of law and government reform—as a senior legal fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies and manager of the think tank’s Election Law Reform Initiative. Read his research. Twitter: @HvonSpakovsky.
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 Signal2019-10-09 07:08:402019-10-11 06:19:06Pelosi Hasn’t Really Started the Impeachment Process
On NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday, former CIA Director John Brennan said “there is a real question about the stability” of the United States under President Trump .
Asked how the CIA would assess the stability of the American government right now as if it were a foreign power, Brennan replied, “We would look at it as a very corrupt government that is under the sway right now of this powerful individual who has been able to just corrupt the institutions and the laws of that country.”
Asked if the U.S. was a stable democracy, Brennan answered, “I think it’s no longer a democracy if an autocrat has it in his hands… Given the tremendous political instability here which is consuming the government now, it’s not able to take care of the issues that it need to address, whether it be on the domestic front or the foreign policy front. Yes, there is a real question about the stability.”
The country would be a great deal more stable if Deep State subversives like Brennan hadn’t spend Trump’s entire term attempting a coup.
In a March 2015 speech at the Council on Foreign Relations, Brennan refused to refer to the Islamic State (ISIS, a.k.a. ISIL) terror group as an “Islamic” entity. Said the CIA director:
“[Q]uite frankly I am amused at the debate that goes on [that] unless you call it [Islamic terrorism] what it is, you don’t know what you’re fighting. And let’s make it very clear that the people who carry out acts of terrorism, whether it be Al Qaeda or the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant [ISIS], are doing it because they believe it is consistent with what their view of Islam is. It is totally inconsistent with what the overwhelming majority of Muslims throughout the world [believe]. And so by ascribing it as a Muslim terrorism or Islamic extremism — I think it does really give them the type of Islamic legitimacy that they are so desperately seeking, but which they don’t deserve at all. They are terrorists, they’re criminals. Many of them are psychopathic thugs, murderers, who use a religious concept and masquerade, mask themselves, in that religious construct. And I do think it does injustice to the tenets of religion when we attach a religious moniker to [ISIS]. The Muslims I know … The people I’ve worked with throughout the Middle East most of my career find just disgraceful that these individuals present themselves as Muslims…. The words we use can have resonance … [W]hat they [ISIS terrorists] do has no basis in any upstanding religions.”
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Discover The Networkshttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDiscover The Networks2019-10-08 05:46:582019-10-08 06:46:19Brennan Questions ‘Stability’ of the U.S. Under Trump
Wait long enough, and everything comes around again. Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), one of the wokest womyn in the world, has this week blazed bold new trails by calling for the revival of not one, but two tried-and-true practices that have inexplicably fallen into neglect in American politics: Jim Crow segregation laws and the arrest of one’s political opponents.
This brave leader said in a Detroit speech that if Trump Cabinet members failed to comply with congressional subpoenas, “they’re trying to figure out, no joke, is it the D.C. police that goes and gets them? We don’t know. Where do we hold them?” Tlaib added: “This is the first time we’ve ever had a situation like this,” and that consequently, she and other Democrat leaders were “trying to tread carefully” into this “uncharted territory.” She volunteered her own district for this noble undertaking: “I will tell them they can hold all those people right here in Detroit.”
Oh, but this territory is amply charted. Tlaib’s vision for America’s future apparently looks a great deal like the past – and present – of authoritarian regimes the world over. The new diverse, inclusive America of Tlaib and her colleagues apparently includes the 2 a.m. pounding on the door and the hustling of a bewildered, pajama-clad conservative by jackbooted stormtroopers into a waiting police van. Then they get hustled off to Detroit, the name of which will take on an air of menace and foreboding, like “Treblinka” and “Kolyma.” And why not? We already have telescreens all over airports and other public spaces pumping CNN propaganda into an unwitting populace 24/7 now; arrests and, presumably, camps for dissenters is the logical next step. After all, that’s what happened in Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, and still happens in North Korea and Communist China. The wise Tlaib knows that our future is their past.
Nor is that all. Tlaib Tuesday toured Detroit’s Public Safety Headquarters and told Detroit police Chief James Craig that facial recognition analysts “need to be African Americans, not people that are not. I think non-African Americans think African Americans all look the same.”
That meant, of course, that Tlaib herself, since she is not African American, thinks all African Americans look the same, but she can be forgiven for being so overwhelmed by her passion for justice that she got a bit confused. Here again, the visionary Tlaib knows that William Faulkner, despite being a white male Southerner and hence obviously racist and manifestly evil, was actually right when he said, “The past isn’t dead. It is not even past.” The old Jim Crow laws of the South in Faulkner’s time are Tlaib’s new vision for America: if she gets her way, you won’t be judged by the content of your character, but by the color of your skin.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Jihad Watchhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngJihad Watch2019-10-07 04:36:252019-10-07 06:18:52Rashida Tlaib Comes Out for Jim Crow-Style Laws, Arrests of Her Political Foes
President Donald Trump is a bull in a china shop. He says inadvisable things to inadvisable people, mainly because he is inadvisable—literally no one can advise him.
The vast majority of things Trump says are ignored or brushed off by those who understand the difference between bloviation and manipulation. Still, Trump’s constant stream of noise can make it difficult to tell the difference between the two.
So when an intelligence community whistleblower came forward with an allegation that, on a call with the Ukrainian president, Trump proposed a quid pro quo with the Ukrainian government—release of military aid in exchange for a Ukrainian investigation into Joe Biden and son Hunter Biden—the allegation didn’t appear absurd on its face.
The timeline, after all, seemed to match up: Trump allegedly suspended military aid to Ukraine personally a week before talking with the Ukrainian president, only to release the aid after the holdup was met with public scrutiny.
Then, the Trump administration released a transcript of the call, in which Trump used the typical New York real estate wheeler-dealer language of favors: favors related to investigations surrounding CrowdStrike, the firm tasked with analyzing the hack of the Democratic National Committee in 2016, an investigation that concluded with allegations of Russian interference; favors related to helping Rudy Giuliani investigate the origins of the 2016 Trump-Russia investigation; favors related to investigating the Bidens. The theory seemed to be gaining credibility.
Then it seemed to fall apart. It turned out that the Ukrainian government apparently had no clue that Trump was even withholding military aid—and without such a quid, there couldn’t be a pro quo. The Ukrainian president publicly proclaimed that Trump hadn’t pressured him.
The whistleblower report turned out to be thirdhand gossip rather than firsthand information. And allegations of a cover-up imploded as the Trump administration released information ranging from the transcript to the whistleblower report itself.
And so, Democrats have begun to move the goalposts. Now Democrats are claiming that the State Department is engaged in obstruction, just minutes after claiming that Trump’s Department of Justice had engaged in obstruction. Democrats allege that Trump’s behavior—without allegations of criminal conduct—is enough to justify impeachment.
Now, after Trump predictably took to Twitter to rail against the whistleblower and the Democrats, Democrats claim his behavior amounts to “witness intimidation.”
As the grounds for the impeachment inquiry broaden, it’s becoming clear that the Democrats’ enthusiasm for impeachment outweighed their supporting evidence. They leapt before they looked—and now they’re trying to backfill an impeachment inquiry that must end with an impeachment vote or lay bare the emptiness of the original attacks themselves.
Perhaps Democrats will come up with something. That’s always possible, given the amount of leaking and loose talk around the White House. But barring some sort of cataclysmic revelation, the impeachment effort seems to be stalling out.
Ben Shapiro is host of “The Ben Shapiro Show” and editor-in-chief of DailyWire.com. He is The New York Times best-selling author of “Bullies.” He is a graduate of UCLA and Harvard Law School, and lives with his wife and two children in Los Angeles. Twitter: @benshapiro.
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!
“Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There was never a democracy that did not commit suicide.”– John Adams, letter to John Taylor, 1814.
“The American Republic will endure, until politicians realize they can bribe the people with their own money.” – Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America.
The Democrats want America to become a democracy. The ideal of a Democracy is not only reflected in their name but it is in their political DNA.
Eliminate the Electoral College – The First Step Toward Suicide
The Democrats want to eliminate the Electoral College and choose the President of the United States by popular vote. They also want to give illegals and non-citizens voting rights. They want Americans, and non-citizens, to vote to commit suicide.
An email from the Progressive Caucus titled “It’s time to put an END to the Electoral College” states:
We can’t forget: in 2016, Trump LOST the popular vote to Hillary Clinton. But thanks to the Electoral College, he’s the President.
If we sit back and allow history to repeat itself, Trump could be re-elected next year!
So we’re taking action NOW and raising $15,000 to support Progressives who are working to abolish the Electoral College.
If you believe that the results of elections should reflect the will of the people, chip in now to help end the Electoral College:
[ … ]
Listen, the Electoral College consistently benefits Republicans at the expense of our democracy.
In fact, 2016 was not the first time a Republican won the presidency after losing the popular vote.
So it’s up to Progressives in Congress to put an end to this antiquated system and enact a National Popular Vote, once and for all.
It’s not going to be easy, but with the help of supporters like you, they can make it happen.
If you believe every vote should truly count in our elections, chip in now to help end the Electoral College:
America is not a Democracy. The U.S. Constitution was set up by the Founding Fathers to prevent the United States from ever becoming a Democracy.
Article 4, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution reads:
Article 4 – The States Section 4 – Republican Government
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.
Republic
republic n1 : a government having a chief of state who is not a monarch and is usually a president; also : a nation or other political unit having such a government 2 : a government in which supreme power is held by the citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by elected officers and representatives governing according to law; also : a nation or other political unit having such a form of government Source: NMW
In the context of the United States of America, both definitions apply.
Conclusion
It’s all about the name. The Republican Party supports the U.S. Constitution and the American republican form of government. Democrats want to change, or even abolish, the U.S. Constitution in order to establish a democracy.
What we are witnessing today is treason led by members of the Democrat Party against a duly elected President. A President who won via the Electoral College.
Treason
treason n the offense of attempting to overthrow the government of one’s country or of assisting its enemies in war
President Trump tweeted the following:
As I learn more and more each day, I am coming to the conclusion that what is taking place is not an impeachment, it is a COUP, intended to take away the Power of the….
….People, their VOTE, their Freedoms, their Second Amendment, Religion, Military, Border Wall, and their God-given rights as a Citizen of The United States of America!
In “The Nature of Government,” Ayn Rand observed, “We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission; which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force.”
Is this a coup? Are we approaching an “ultimate inversion” by the deep state?
We report, you will vote your conscience on Tuesday, November 3rd, 2020!
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Dr. Rich Swierhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDr. Rich Swier2019-10-04 05:11:362019-10-05 05:32:14What is wrong with Democrats? It’s in their party’s name, stupid!
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
Masked members of Antifa blocked the way of an elderly woman using a walker, berating her by yelling, “Nazi Scum, off our streets!” (See video below)
The woman was trying to attend a fundraising event featuring Maxime Bernier, founder of the People’s Party of Canada, considered by the protesters as right-wing and, thus, unacceptable.
The video shows the woman’s husband coming to her aid as they attempt to cross a street to enter Mohawk College in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada.
Her husband can be seen trying to reason with a female protester, who can be heard screaming at him, “Don’t you f***ing touch me!”
He eventually got help from police officers who intervened and escorted the couple into the building, where Bernier was – ironically – holding a discussion with U.S. political commentator Dave Rubin on free speech and censorship.
Bernier supports stricter immigration laws and opposes the “extreme multiculturalism and cult of diversity” of current Canadian Prime Justin Trudeau.
Before he founded the People’s Party, Bernier was a member of the Conservative party where he served as a member of parliament as well as Minister of Industry, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of State for Small Business and Tourism. In 2017, he nearly won the leadership of the party.
Counter-protesters showed up to oppose Antifa, who unsuccessfully put maximum pressure on Mohawk College to cancel the event. Four arrests were made (two from each side) for breaching the peace.
Police are currently reviewing the video of the event before deciding to arrest the specific individuals involved in the incident.
Antifa has a history of violent protests, most recently when they targeted journalist Andy Ngo, among others, at a protest in Portland. Ngo ended up in the hospital with a brain bleed from the injuries he sustained. Others ended up with bleeding heads as well.
Antifa was also responsible for the 2017 violent demonstration and subsequent riots in Berkeley. Its members were reacting to conservative pundit Milo Yiannopoulos being invited to speak on campus. During the riots, Antifa members smashed the windows of a Marine Corps recruiting office after sucker-punching someone who voiced opposition to them.
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
Raynard Jackson is fed up with how conservatives approach black Americans. The political strategist, columnist, and president and CEO of Raynard Jackson & Associates says conservatives need to try something new, because while there’s a lot of shared values between conservatives and African Americans, that’s getting lost right now.
“Until Republicans … and the conservative movement deal with this issue of race, they will never ever get a massive amount of black support, period,” Jackson says. Read the lightly edited transcript, posted below, or listen on the podcast:
Rob Bluey: I’m joined by Raynard Jackson. He’s the president and CEO of Raynard Jackson & Associates, a great political strategist in Washington, D.C., and a longtime friend of our president, Kay Coles James, and The Heritage Foundation.
Raynard Jackson: Thank you, Rob. Thanks for inviting me.
Bluey:You and I got to know each other at a meeting that we both attended on Capitol Hill and the thing that I loved about you is you are always bringing new ideas to the table, particularly about how conservatives can do a better job of communicating and taking their ideas into the black community.
Congress is trying to ramrod through increased gun laws upon the American people. But will that really stop the rise of gun violence? Find out more now >>
You’ve written a piece for The Daily Signal about this. You recently had a meeting at the White House about this. So I’m hoping that we can spend some time here in this interview hearing some of your ideas and how conservatives can do a better job.
Jackson: I look forward to it. Thank you.
Bluey: So you write for The Daily Signal. Your first column that you’ve written for us says that the black community is naturally conservative. What do you mean by that?
Jackson: Within the black community, despite what the liberal media projects us to be, we are very conservative, very church-going. And I’m telling you even today, Rob, there is a strict sense of discipline in the black household, whether it’s a traditional family or a single parent. Black women, they don’t play with their kids. If you get out of line, you’re going to get spanked, period. And the black family is the key to the strength in the black community.
I remember when growing up as a kid, I would be sitting on my grandmother’s lap and she would sit up there and talk about what’s right, what’s wrong, what to do, what not to do, family history. And so when I was in college, I would come home on a weekend and my parents were fine with me going out with my fellows, hanging out at the club and all that stuff. But come Sunday morning, eight o’clock is like, “Boy, or are you ready for church?” Not, “Boy, are you going to church?” There was no option. So yeah, I could hang out all night, seven, eight in the morning if I want to, but come eight o’clock we going to church, period.
Bluey: I think those values that you get from having that belief in faith and going to a religious organization like a church [are] definitely in alignment with the traditional American values that conservatives seem to embrace.
Where do you see the challenge then that conservatives face in terms of breaking through and communicating to members of that community?
Jackson: Well, it’s very simple. When you say “conservative” to black folks, what we hear is “Strom Thurmond,” “Jesse Helms” back in the day. And for [the] audience who may not be familiar, … Strom Thurmond ran on a states rights, on the Dixiecrat ticket in 1948 for president. Jesse Helms was a senator of North Carolina. Strom Thurmond’s a senator from South Carolina, segregationist, racist, but both of them over a period of years, they kind of left that legacy and they became very supportive, for example, of historically black colleges, which you have several of them in South [Carolina] and North Carolina. But that’s what we hear.
So what I tell conservatives [is], as opposed to using the word “conservative,” a better term in a black community is “traditional values.” Because again, that transports you back when you were a little kid sitting on grandma’s lap. And that’s kind of a verbal nuance that conservatives need to understand.
Bluey: That’s a great point. Thank you for sharing that. But I want to ask you, because, historically, going back to Abraham Lincoln, the Republican Party for its at least early history, was associated in many ways with the abolitionist movement and helping, obviously, to fight the Civil War and to give blacks and African Americans those rights. And then all of the sudden, today it’s the complete opposite.
So where did the Republican Party now, I’d separate that from conservative specifically, go wrong?
Jackson: No. 1, they decided to throw away the black vote in 1968 with the adoption by President [Richard] Nixon of the Southern strategy, which meant they decided that it was worth more for them to go after white Southern Democrats, the old Dixiecrat in the South, at the expense of the black community who had been the most loyal voting block up until that time for the Republican Party.
How blacks are today for the Democrats, we were that same type of loyalty to the Republicans back in the day. And even with that, Nixon got a third of the black vote. So until Republicans, Rob, and the conservative movement deal with this issue of race, they will never ever get a massive amount of black support, period.
Bluey: But you’re taking it head-on. You went to Florida. You worked for Gov. Ron DeSantis, then-candidate Ron DeSantis, and you made significant inroads, and really in that close election were able to, I think, make up the difference. So tell us what happened in Florida and how you were able to do that.
Jackson: Yeah. Gov. DeSantis is the good friend and when he was in congress last September, a year ago this month matter of fact, he called me after he became the nominee and asked me to come down and serve as one of his senior advisers, and of course I agreed to it.
He said, “hey, I want you to go and just do what you do. I know the kind of work you can do. And you let me know what you need from the campaign and we’re going to make sure we get it to you.”
We were polling at 2% of the black vote then. We ended up getting 17% of the black vote.
Bluey: Wow.
Jackson: The two issues that resonated were entrepreneurship and school choice and vouchers. And then our opponent, Andrew Gillum, the mayor of Tallahassee at the time, two of his campaign platforms were to raise taxes on small minority businesses and to get rid of the school choice voucher program in Florida. And … DeSantis said, “No, those are the two of my strongest points.” As a result of that, we got just enough black support that that was his margin of victory.
If we can replicate that across the country and within the conservative movement, blacks will support a conservative candidate, but no one goes into the community and asks for their support.
Bluey: More recently you were at the White House with a number of other black Americans who went to the press secretary, went to the vice president’s communications director and others and talked about the importance of making sure that the message is getting out.
I want to ask you two parts. I want to hear more about the meeting and why it was so significant. I understand that a meeting like this didn’t take place when President [Barack] Obama was in the White House. And secondly, I want to hear your assessment of President [Donald] Trump and his policies and how they have impacted the black community.
Jackson: Well, two interesting questions. The National Newspaper Publishers Association, [the] NNPA—that’s a consortium of the over 200 black newspapers in the country—their executive board was in town two weeks ago for some other meetings.
So, they have been complaining to me because they syndicate my weekly column to over these 200 newspapers about access to the administration. When their reporters are trying to do stories, they can’t get calls returned because no one knows who they are. And a lot of time, let’s face it, Rob, conservatives and Republicans, when they get a call from a black media outlet, their default position is going to be a hit piece. So, therefore, we don’t return their call, and that’s garbage.
I called the White House and me and Pastor Mark Burns, a close supporter of the president’s, and the White House, Stephanie Grisham, Hogan Gidley and Darin Miller from the vice president’s press office, they were so excited. They said, “Can we get a meeting with them this week while in town?” And we said, “Yeah.” And they moved heaven and earth on their schedule to sit and spend an hour with us to talk about what these newspaper publishers’ issues were, and we got a lot of work done. And that issue of access, they committed then that that would no longer be an issue.
Tell me a little bit about the Trump administration and the policies. You and I got to know each other during the tax cut push back in 2017, of course that was a big initiative and the president’s first year. You help take that message to new communities. It’s obviously had a tremendous impact on the economy overall. We also see that black unemployment is at record lows. Is President Trump getting the credit that he deserves for the policies?
Jackson: Of course not. The liberal media is not going to do it for sure and within the black media—and we talked about this at the White House, and I was over there last week talking with them as well as a follow-up on some other issues. We, … the administration and Republicans and conservatives, we need to do a better job of effectively communicating the successful legislation that this administration has done that’s benefiting the black community.
This administration had done a lot to help the historically black colleges. The story has not been effectively told. And so then when the president goes to his town hall and rallies across the country and talks about the low unemployment in the black community, those are great statistics. But as I told the White House, we have to breathe life into those statistics, put meat on those bones, and we have to show the human face of those statistics and we have to start bringing out human faces and putting a face with those statistics.
And they want to have another conversation next week about what that means on a practical level. What I told them, for example, when the White House talks about the tax cuts in 2017 that we worked on, “Wouldn’t it be great for the president to have two or three black entrepreneurs to talk about how their firm has benefited from the tax cuts and as a result of those tax cuts, they’ve had to hire more people and how their revenues have increased as a result?” Now we got something to work with. We got a visual and we got the facts … Republicans and conservatives [are] great at statistics, horrible at weaving a story.
Bluey: Those sound like great stories that we’d like to tell at The Daily Signal. So let’s keep in touch about that. We’ve done several already about the tax cuts and I think that there are certainly more that have gone untold, so [I] would like to know more about them.
Now, we’ve talked about some of the economic pieces, obviously HBCUs is … another piece that you brought up. What are some of the other policies that you think President Trump might not be getting credit for that have had an impact positively on the black community?
Jackson: Oh, religious freedom. Not only just overseas, because that’s a big issue. Christians are being persecuted, for example, in Northern Nigeria, and no one talks about that. Boko Haram is there, and if they find out you are a Christian, they will put a car tire around your neck, set it on fire, and torture you. And they force little girls who say they’re Christian either to renounce their Christianity, [or] they rape them and then kill them. That’s going on right now.
And then domestically, a lot of black churches are very frustrated until President Trump comes along, because some of these churches are getting federal money, but then being told, “If you take federal money, you cannot talk about Christianity and faith because you took federal money.”
And President Trump has said, “No, we want you to take federal money if you’re impacting your local community. And we know that your success is predicated on your Christian faith and values instilling in those constituents you’re working with. So it’s foolish to deny you opportunity because of faith, because faith is the one that keeps these people off of drugs and out of being homeless. And so the federal government wants you to stop preaching the solution? Really?” And he’s getting a lot of credit for that in a black church. That story has not been told.
Bluey:That’s great to know.
The thing I love about your columns is that you’re very honest. You tell it like it is. You’re not afraid to pull punches and whatnot. And you’ve tackled some tough topics. You’re not afraid to call out people when you think that they’ve done something wrong.
So tell me, how do you approach writing your column and choosing the topics that you do? And what kind of feedback do you get when sometimes, maybe, you touched on a more controversial issue?
Jackson: Well, Rob, thanks a lot for helping me out with this. Good thing you’re not a publicist, man.
You know what’s funny is, and a lot of my clients are in music, because [I’ve] had to work a lot with R&B artists, and we’re in the studio talking and they are amazed that my writing is the same as they’re writing songs. There’s really no difference because a lot of times, I sit down at the keyboard, I may have in my mind I’m going to write about “subject matter A,” but then my fingers just kind of take a life of their own. And what I originally sat down to write about has nothing to do with what I just wrote.
So a lot of time, I just stream of consciousness and I have no idea what I’m going to write until I actually sit at the keyboard and I see the finished product.
And as I go back over some of the columns I’ve written, it’s like, that came out of you? I’m stunned. And so yeah, you’re right, Rob. I’ve been accused of being blunt and very honest, but I’m just at a point in life, Rob, where I just don’t have time to be all touchy-feely. If you ask me a question or if I take a position, everything I’ve ever written in the column, I believe. So it’s not like I’m writing for effect or to cause controversy. If I write it, I believe it, period.
… What’s amazing is I get so many emails saying, “I’m glad you said that.” … And I’ve had some people in the party, to be honest with you, Rob, called me and said, “Hey, if you toned down some of your writings, we can help you with more opportunity within the party.” And my response is, “My integrity is not for sale. My columns are for sale, but not my integrity.”
And yes, I probably have been denied some opportunities because of some of the bluntness in my column. But I challenge anyone who reads my column, Rob, to argue with me about the truthfulness of what I wrote.
Now, you may not like what I wrote, you may not like the verbiage I use, but you’re not going to argue with my facts. Those are true and they’re verifiable, and so, I’m willing to live with the consequences.
Bluey: It takes a lot of courage to have strong opinions, and I certainly appreciate sitting across from somebody who does and has the integrity to do that. So thank you.
Jackson: Wow. It’s funny. MSNBC was doing a slam piece on the president, as they usually do, and something popped on my computer screen about Dennis Rodman. And I like, that’s interesting. Donald Trump is the Dennis Robert of politics, meaning a lot of people think Dennis Rodman was crazy, he was a fool, he was a buffoon. But then when you stop to think about it, he was so good at what he did …
Bluey: Yes.
Jackson: Not one person in the NBA would have turned down the opportunity to have Dennis Rodman on their team. Dennis Rodman played for the Chicago Bulls and the San Antonio Spurs and a few other teams.
… A lot of people had a problem with his antics off the court. Remember when he wore the wedding dress? Most people didn’t realize he got paid $10 million to wear that dress. You offer me that, Rob, I’m in a dress tonight. OK?
But the thing about it is, … he was named seven times in a row NBA player of the year. He was a rebound leader for seven to 10 years in a row. So when he got on the court, he delivered the goods.
So it is with President Trump. You may not like some of his tweets. You may not like how he responds to him being attacked by opponents. But if you go to war, you want him in the foxhole with you, because if you lose, the guy that won is going have blood all over them.
And that’s what conservatives like about this president. He fights for the conservative agenda. And so, with the president comes a lot of theatrics and drama, like Dennis Rodman. But there’s nobody privately who’s going to say, “I wouldn’t want this president on my side.” And that’s how I connected the two.
Bluey:That’s certainly true. … Raynard Jackson, you’re a Pulitzer Award-nominated columnist. You can find your most recent work at DailySignal.com. What haven’t we talked about that you’d like our listeners to know about you?
Jackson: Most people are shocked when they find I went to Oral Roberts University and I’m from St. Louis. … I used to work with Oral for four years, I used to be one of the camera men for the TV show, and he would always tell me, “Go into every man’s world and meet them at the point of their need.” And I’ve never forgotten that.
Any student there remembers that. They may forget their mother’s name, but they’re not going to forget that statement Oral Roberts used to say.
Back in the day, when I moved up here in the early ’90s, Rob, I would be walking down the street like on K Street, like K and 9th and 10th, 11th, 12th Street, which is all upscale now. Back in the day, you used to have prostitution and drug dealers and all that.
So I may be walking down the street with a friend and you would have prostitutes calling me by name. And my buddies would look at me like, “Whoa, these girls actually know your name? Are you patronizing?” I said, “Heck no.” But what I found interesting … go into every man’s world and meet them at the point of their need. I would go into the red light district where the prostitutes were. I just wanted to hear their story.
And you know what, Rob? Most of these women who were on the street corner were not dumb people. A lot of them had college degrees, but they fell on various levels of hard time and they did what they had to do to make it.
… I just found when you make choices, I don’t have to agree with your choice to … just sit down and talk with you, to find out what your story is. And a lot of them I ended up helping out. They transitioned to getting back on their feet.
But people tend to believe that if a person doesn’t agree with you somehow you should have nothing to do with them. And I’m just the opposite. And people are amazed when I walk into a Democrat event, which I go to a lot of them, and they’re like, “Wait a minute, I thought you were Republican?”
“Yeah, I am very Republican, but my buddy’s hosting this event, so I’m coming out to support him. I don’t agree with a doggone thing he’s saying politically, but he’s my buddy.”
Bluey: That is a theme it seems we keep touching on on this show and it’s really important for our listeners to remember, as you said, meet people where they are. You don’t necessarily have to agree with everything that they believe in. But there are a lot of things that we can do, particularly conservatives can do, to make inroads if we show up and engage in conversation.
Jackson: And see, Rob, it’s interesting you said [that.] This is the opportunity, I think, that this president, The Heritage Foundation, and the conservative movement all have in common, that black folks are allies already. But we just never get invited to the party, No. 1.
The other thing, and maybe we can talk about this at a future date, Rob, one thing conservatives really need to understand is, when they talk to the black community, they force us to make a Hobson’s choice. Meaning, they ask us, “Which are you? Are you black or are you Republican? Are you black or are you conservative?” As though you can’t be both.
So a lot of times, and I think you and I talked about this, sometimes Republicans and conservatives do and say things that we in the black community find offensive and we call them out on that. That doesn’t mean we’re not good party people and good conservatives, but we can’t have credibility in our community and try to ignore and justify an indignity done by someone in the movement.
A lot of times when I’ve criticized the party in my columns, like you indicated, I’ll get emails from influential people in the party, in the movement saying, “Well, we thought you were on our side and you criticize.” It’s like I don’t have to give up my blackness to be a part of the movement. I can be both, but wrong is wrong. And that doesn’t mean because I criticize my party that I’m not a good supporter.
The reason I stay in this party, Rob, when part of me tells me to leave this party because of some of the things we go through as blacks, the easy part would be for me to leave the party. The sign of a true leader is one who stands in the middle of difficulty and tries to make it better from within.
That’s why when a lot of my Democratic friends say, “Why do you not leave this party with the racist rhetoric coming out?” It’s like, yeah, that’s easy for me to do. And then what?
But if I stay engaged and keep speaking out using the media platform that I have, Rob, with The Daily Signal and The Heritage Foundation and other outlets, I can make change on the inside and make the movement and the party better for all of America. And that’s what my goal is.
Bluey: As a fellow American, I applaud you for taking the harder course and not the easier path because we really need you out there advocating for these ideas and … using media effectively. I think that that’s so important and that’s one of the reasons we created The Daily Signal and why [we are] so proud to have you as a new contributor to our team.
So, Raynard Jackson, how do our readers go and find more about you if they want to follow you on Twitter or social media or other places?
Jackson: Raynard1223 is my Twitter [handle]. Just Google me, all my social media pops up. Black Americans for a Better Future is my 527 super PAC, BAFBF.
Rob, thank you so much for having me. It’s been fun. And time has gone by too fast, but maybe you’ll have me back again over the next 30 or 40 years.
Bluey: We certainly will. Hopefully a lot sooner than that.
Raynard Jackson has been my guest. Thanks so much.
Rob Bluey is executive editor of The Daily Signal, the multimedia news organization of The Heritage Foundation. Send an email to Rob. Twitter: @RobertBluey.
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 Signal2019-09-30 04:59:182019-10-01 06:31:40PODCAST: Despite Liberal Media’s Narrative, His Community Is ‘Very Conservative,’ Black Strategist Says
We’re Filled with PRIDE (Equality Democrats) in a September 27th, 2019 email titled “we’re sending Jonathan Van Ness a card (will you sign??)” state:
Rich, our hearts are FILLED with pride — Queer Eye’s Jonathan Van Ness came out as HIV positive:
2O,OOO Equality Democrats Needed: Sign the Card to Thank Jonathan Van Ness for his bravery >>
SIGN THE CARD TO THANK JONATHAN VAN NESS →
We know about 1.1 MILLION people in the U.S. are living with HIV.
We know research shows more than 38,000 were diagnosed in 2017.
And we know Trump wants to SILENCE them all!
But LGBT+ icon Jonathan Van Ness is bravely sharing his story with the WORLD. We could not be more proud!!
He has opened up about his experiences with sexual assault, sex work, and addiction in hopes to shed light on these traumas, which are far too common in the LGBT+ community.
Through the ups and downs of his own life, he is working to destigmatize HIV and the realities of being an LGBT+ American.
Jonathan Van Ness is nothing short of I-N-C-R-E-D-I-B-L-E!!!
So we’re sending him a card to say THANK YOU for everything he is doing for LGBT+ rights and true Equality.
Don’t miss your chance to express your gratitude. Sign the card to Jonathan Van Ness below >>
SIGN THE CARD TO THANK JONATHAN VAN NESS →
https://go.fightforequality.org/Thank-JVN
-Equality Democrats
When you click on the SIGN THE CARD TO THANK JOHATHAN VAN NESS it takes you to an Equality Democrats page where there is a form (below). The Equality Democrats ask for personal information and at the end ask for a donation:
LGBT+ icon Jonathan Van Ness is bravely sharing his HIV story with the WORLD. We could not be more proud!!
Sign the card to tell him THANK YOU right now:
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Dr. Rich Swierhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngDr. Rich Swier2019-09-28 07:16:382021-07-16 17:56:08Democrats fund raise off of the tragedy of a gay man having HIV! How low can Dems go?
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
This week the feds busted 38 individuals they say are responsible for addiction and death in New Hampshire.
The operation dubbed “Devil’s Highway” once again brought attention to Trump’s words about how Lawrence, Mass. is a hub for the distribution of dangerous opioids and other drugs throughout New England.
And, it sure looks like ‘new Americans’ are responsible….
President Trump’s Lawrence comments back in spotlight after massive drug bust
“For anyone who said Lawrence is not a hub for distribution, how you looking now?” said N.H. state Rep. Fred Doucette, who was a state co-chair for Trump’s 2016 campaign.
“This definitely solidifies some statements that people took offense to,” Doucette added.
“Incidents like this are proof positive of the fact that Lawrence is a hub.”
The 10-week enforcement operation in the Merrimack Valley targeted drug distribution in Lawrence, and trafficking between Lawrence and destinations in New Hampshire.
These U.S. attorney prosecutions should resonate with New Hampshire voters, said Republican activist Fran Wendelboe.
For details on the bust see Monday’s US Justice Departmentpress release:
Merrimack Valley Operation Results in Arrest of 38 Individuals
See the names of those arrested (no mention of their immigration status).
During the operation, the following defendants were arrested on federal charges:
Jason Medlen, 32, of Methuen, charged with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl and possession with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl;
Louis Delvecchio, 51, of Methuen, charged with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl and possession with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl;
Santos Obispo Guerrera Lara, 35, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Douglas “Sunny” Grasso, 34, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to distribute fentanyl and possession with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl;
Brian Brae, 35, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to distribute fentanyl and possession with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl;
Enel Alfredo Mendez-Aquino, 29, of Lawrence, charged with distribution of fentanyl and cocaine;
Jorge Alexander Andujar Romero, 29, of Lawrence, charged with distribution of and possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Edward Jesis Mar Carmona Ortiz, 42, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Steven de Jesus de Leon Trinidad, 22, of Lawrence, charged with distribution and possession with intent to distribute a heroine/fentanyl mix;
Luis Felix Franco Herrera, 21, of Lawrence, charged with distribution of and possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Jose Rodriquez-Walker, 32, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Johanny Mejia-Nunez, 43, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute 400 grams or more of fentanyl;
Ronyel Pena, 18, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Joe Martinez, 24, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Ysrael Nunez, 37, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to distribute and possession with intent to distribute 400 grams or more of fentanyl; distribution of and possession with intent to distribute fentanyl; distribution of and possession with intent to distribute 400 grams or more of fentanyl; and aiding and abetting;
William Cabrera, 30, of Lawrence, charged with distribution of and possession with intent to distribute heroin; and possession with intent to distribute heroin and oxycodone;
Oscar Guadalupe Martinez, 37, of North Andover, charged with conspiracy with intent to distribute and distribution of 400 grams or more of fentanyl and 1 kilogram or more of heroin;
Stiven Torres Martinez, 21, of North Andover, charged with conspiracy with intent to distribute and distribution of 400 grams or more of fentanyl and 1 kilogram or more of heroin;
Jason Jimenez, 24, of Bronx, New York, charged with possession with intent to distribute over 40 grams of fentanyl;
Milton Elias Lara, 42, of Lawrence, charged with distribution of and possession with intent to distribute 40 grams or more of fentanyl;
Alexsander Padro, 28, of Methuen, charged with distribution of 40 grams or more of fentanyl;
John Mena, 24, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute and distribution of 10 grams or more of acryl fentanyl, a controlled substance analogue;
Yunior Darismir Prandys Torres, 22, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and to distribute a controlled substance, to wit, fentanyl;
Juan Perez Diaz, 22, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and to distribute a controlled substance, to wit, fentanyl;
Jose Ventura, 37, of Lawrence, charged with distribution of and possession with intent to distribute 10 grams or more of fentanyl;
Leisy Baez-Zapata, 21, of Lawrence, charged with conspiracy to distribute and possession with intent to distribute 400 grams or more of fentanyl; distribution of and possession with intent to distribute 400 grams or more of fentanyl; and aiding and abetting;
Erick Alberto Paulino Amador, 28, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute and distribution of fentanyl;
Bernardito Carvajal, 28, of Haverhill, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Alfredo Rivera, 31, of Haverhill, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Julio Esthil-Cifre, 30, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Edgar Castro, 45, of Revere, charged with conspiracy to distribute and to possess with intent to distribute 5 kilograms or more of cocaine;
Julio Ortiz-Chaparro, 47, of Boston, charged with conspiracy to distribute and to possess with intent to distribute 5 kilograms or more of cocaine;
Crishanty Aybar Arias, 22, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Cesar Lara Castillo, 36, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute a Schedule I controlled substance; false representation of social security number, and aggravated identity theft;
Santiago Rubel Guerrero Tejeda, 22, of Bani, Dominican Republic, charged with possession with intent to distribute and distribution of fentanyl;
Jesus Maria Aybar Franco, 34, of Lawrence, charged with distribution and possession with intent to distribute fentanyl;
Marino Amador Baez, 34, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute fentanyl; and
Willin Arias-Castillo, 35, of Lawrence, charged with possession with intent to distribute and distribution of fentanyl.
http://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.png00Ann Corcoranhttp://drrich.wpengine.com/wp-content/uploads/logo_264x69.pngAnn Corcoran2019-09-25 10:06:422019-09-25 10:07:18President Was Right: ‘Devil’s Highway’ from Massachusetts to NH Brought Drugs to Granite State
