Vice President Kamala Harris talks to reporters after arriving at El Paso International Airport on June 25 in El Paso, Texas. PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images
Newsweek reached out to the White House for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
Reprint. Protesters Await Kamala Harris at Border With ‘Que Mala’ and ‘Trump Won’ Signs. So she was off by almost 1,000 miles. Hey this was just a refueling stop on her way out to LA. Six months on the job, who wouldn’t need a fourth vacation. Snicker snicker snort snort.
Critics of Vice President Kamala Harris were lined up to protest early Friday morning ahead of the vice president’s first visit to the U.S.-Mexico border in El Paso, Texas.
Harris, who President Joe Biden tasked with spearheading his administration’s response to undocumented immigration and the influx of migrants at the border, is scheduled to visit the El Paso Central Processing Center, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) facility, on Friday. The vice president will be joined by Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas as well as a couple of Democratic lawmakers.
Protesters awaiting Harris’ arrival held signs showing support for former President Donald Trump, with some falsely asserting that “Trump won” the 2020 election, video from the demonstration posted online showed. Several held signs reading “Que Mala Harris,” a Spanish play on the vice president’s name. “Que mala” translates in English to “how mean.” One demonstrator held a sign that asked, “Kamala do you hear their screams?”
— Anthony Cabassa (IWA) (@AnthonyCabassa_) June 25, 2021
Harris and Biden have faced substantial criticism from Republicansand some Democratic lawmakers over their response to the uptick in undocumented migrants coming to the southern border. GOP lawmakers have attacked Harris for not visiting the border sooner, particularly because she has been tasked with leading the administration’s response to the situation.
In May, CBP encountered more than 180,000 migrants crossing the southwestern border with Mexico. That represented a 1 percent increase over April and a more substantial increase over the approximately 172,000 migrants CBP detained in March. Republicans have argued that Biden’s rollback of some of Trump’s hardline immigration policies have resulted in the surge in undocumented immigrants and asylum seekers.
Reprint. How funny is this? America’s Largest Union Under Threat of Staff Strike Over ‘Anti-Union’ Tactics. I had to laugh when I read this.
The National Education Association Staff Organization (NEASO) — representing the staff of America’s largest labor union — has evidently hit an impasse in a labor dispute over what employees at the National Education Association called out as a “slew of anti-union delay tactics.”
The result of the impasse: a secret vote of members that yielded 98 percent support for authorizing a strike. Essentially, the union for employees of the nation’s largest union is ready to strike against said union for allegedly being anti-union.
NEA staffers are not keeping quiet about how they’re being treated, either.
“After persevering to support our nation’s educators and their #UNION through the #COVID19 pandemic, NEA’s bargaining approaches and offers are a slap in the face,” tweeted one employee.
Even as its own staff threatens a strike, NEA told the Washington Post “it is fully committed to and respects the collective bargaining process and unequivocally supports our staff’s right to use that process to advocate for themselves.”
The staff organization stated that “striking is a last resort, but it is something we are ready to do” in response to what its members characterize as “asking staff to accept stagnant pay now and well into the future at a time when inflation and the cost of living are skyrocketing” while “also trying to hike healthcare costs and slash retirement benefits that were promised to employees who dedicated their careers to the union’s mission.”
Reprint. So why aren’t we hearing more about how Joe is taking a beating in the courts? Biden’s bad run. He’s doing worse in the courts than Trump. Ye Joe’s had one loss after another. Here’s a snapshot.
President Biden repeatedly framed his campaign and his administration as defending “the rule of law” after what he and others portrayed as the lawless reign of President Trump. The image of Biden as restoring the Justice Department back into the good graces of the law and the courts is reinforced regularly in the media.
What is not being as fully reported is that Biden actually has racked up a litany of notable court losses that may now exceed those of his predecessor in his first six months. Indeed, the Biden administration has been found to have violated the Constitution in a surprising array of cases in a surprisingly short period of time.
Across the country, trial courts have been finding constitutional violations by the Biden administration in areas ranging from immigration to the environment to pandemic relief. The administration actually began with the same court record as the Trump administration, which lost an early challenge to its travel ban. (The Supreme Court later upheld the core elements of the travel ban and rejected the general claims raised against it.) Biden also lost a critical immigration fight when a federal court enjoined his 100-day moratorium on deportations. In a 105-page opinion, the court found that the administration omitted “any rational explanation grounded in the facts reviewed and the factors considered” and left only “an arbitrary and capricious choice” of the president in this early immigration order. Sound familiar? It should: That was the same argument used against Trump.
In Wisconsin, a federal court stopped Biden’s controversial $4 billion race-based federal relief program for farmers after finding that he was engaging in systemic racial discrimination. The court found that “the only consideration in determining whether a farmer or rancher’s loans should be completely forgiven is the person’s race or national origin.” As such, farmers were found to be “experiencing discrimination at the hands of their government.”
A court in Texas found that the Biden administration engaged in systemic discrimination to implement COVID-19 relief for American restaurants by giving preference to women, minorities and “socially and economically disadvantaged” people.
In Louisiana, a federal court enjoined the administration from carrying out its halting of gas and oil leases, finding that Biden’s unilateral action violated the separation of powers under the Constitution.
In Washington, D.C., a federal judge found that the Biden administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention exceeded its authority by imposing a federal eviction moratorium to help stop the spread of the coronavirus. The court rejected the administration’s sweeping claims of pandemic authority, a view taken by other (but not all) courts in a dispute that could go to the Supreme Court.
These rulings against the Biden administration came in the same areas covered extensively by the media during the Trump administration, including findings of constitutional violations and discriminatory practices. When early rulings were issued against Trump, legal and media experts declared that a war on the rule of law existed, if not the onset of tyranny. However, the media has given light coverage to Biden’s legal losses.
One of the most remarkable court losses was delivered at the hands of the Supreme Court in the case of Terry v. United States. It involved a criminal defendant in a crack case who argued for a sentence reduction under the First Step Act. The Trump administration argued against the defendant’s claim — but this was one of many positions that the Biden administration changed before the court. The Biden administration informed the court that it not only would refuse to defend the judgment below — and defend the federal statute — but was “confessing error” in the case.
The move by the Biden Administration was astonishing on a number of levels. Acting Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar informed the Supreme Court in March, on the actual due date for the government’s brief. Oral argument was scheduled for April; the court was forced to reschedule the oral argument for a special sitting in May, a completely avoidable conflict the administration created by waiting a ridiculous two months to inform the court. The Biden Justice Department simply suggested in a letter that the Supreme Court find someone else to defend a federal law. Moreover, the Biden administration was confessing error in a case where the government was likely to win. In other words, it was refusing to make an argument with which many if not most of the justices would agree.
Instead, the Biden administration advanced an argument that was so weak that the justices referred to its arguments as a meritless “sleight of hand” to evade the clear, obvious meaning of the statute. They ruled unanimously against the administration and the defendant. Eight justices signed on to the opinion of Justice Clarence Thomas entirely, and Justice Sonia Sotomayor concurred with his interpretation of the First Step Act. So, the Biden Justice Department confessed error and abandoned an argument that, ultimately, garnered a unanimous vote of the Supreme Court.
While continually claiming to be a champion of “the rule of law” in public, the Biden administration has been found to be a transgressor in these cases. These losses constitute an inauspicious start for any administration.
President Biden repeatedly framed his campaign and his administration as defending “the rule of law” after what he and others portrayed as the lawless reign of President Trump. The image of Biden as restoring the Justice Department back into the good graces of the law and the courts is reinforced regularly in the media.
What is not being as fully reported is that Biden actually has racked up a litany of notable court losses that may now exceed those of his predecessor in his first six months. Indeed, the Biden administration has been found to have violated the Constitution in a surprising array of cases in a surprisingly short period of time.
Across the country, trial courts have been finding constitutional violations by the Biden administration in areas ranging from immigration to the environment to pandemic relief. The administration actually began with the same court record as the Trump administration, which lost an early challenge to its travel ban. (The Supreme Court later upheld the core elements of the travel ban and rejected the general claims raised against it.) Biden also lost a critical immigration fight when a federal court enjoined his 100-day moratorium on deportations. In a 105-page opinion, the court found that the administration omitted “any rational explanation grounded in the facts reviewed and the factors considered” and left only “an arbitrary and capricious choice” of the president in this early immigration order. Sound familiar? It should: That was the same argument used against Trump.
In the early months of the Trump administration, I noted that “the White House gave the courts a target-rich environment in the first travel order, which was poorly drafted, poorly executed and poorly defended.” The same is true with the Biden administration; it has racked up losses for engaging in systemic racial and gender discrimination, exceeding its constitutional authority, and acting arbitrarily and capriciously in carrying out federal policy.
Of course, it still could prevail on appeal in some of these cases, as did Trump in his win on the travel ban before the Supreme Court. However, like the prior administration, the Biden administration has shown serious deficiencies in arguing these early cases in court.
President Biden has declared that “every country faces challenges to the rule of law, including my own.” His administration has, thus far, proven just how difficult that challenge can be.
Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University. You can find his updates on Twitter @JonathanTurley.
California labor union Unite Here dispatched hundreds of well-paid activists to Georgia and Arizona to canvass and register voters, as well as controversially "curing" ballots after the fact. / IMAGE: uniteherevideos via YouTube
Reprint. Calif. Labor Union Sent Hundreds of Paid Activists to ‘Cure’ Ballots in Ariz., Ga. ‘A whole heap of votes ended up being counted that would have been discarded otherwise, in a state ultimately decided by 10,457 votes.
The union dispatched more than 300 activists from the Los Angeles area to join hundreds more in Arizona, receiving “about $17 per hour plus benefits, paid for by the union’s 504(c)(4) wing, CASE (Central Arizonans for a Sustainable Economy) Action, and its federal super PAC, the Worker Power PAC.”
While writing to a sympathetic audience about the fait accompli, the rag gloated in its latest cover-story that a California-based labor union had been deployed to help “cure” ballots—and that the outcome in at least two crucial swing states, Arizona and Georgia, “was no accident.”
The admission, first flagged by RedState, followed in the footsteps of Time—which admitted, shortly after Democrat Joe Biden was installed in the White House, that a cabalistic klatch of conspirators had engaged in censorship, suppression and disinformation campaigns to sway public sentiment, often exploiting crises such as the coronavirus pandemic to achieve their overtly political ends.
“They played a key role in unseating Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio in 2016, after narrowly failing to defeat him four years earlier,” it wrote, referencing the victory of radical-leftist lawman Paul Penzone, who was heavily funded by billionaire oligarch George Soros.
“They returned again to help Kyrsten Sinema win her US Senate seat in 2018,” it continued. And “[i]n the summer of 2020 … they had their sights set on the biggest prize of all: Arizona’s 11 Electoral College votes, which they knew could prove pivotal in the presidential race.”
Reprint. Judge halts Biden pause on new public lands oil leasing.
A federal judge has issued an order temporarily blocking the Biden administration’s pause on new oil and gas leasing on public land and waters.
The preliminary injunction from U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty follows lawsuits over the leasing pause from more than a dozen Republican-led states. Doughty, a Trump appointee in Louisiana, did not make an ultimate determination as to the legality of the pause on Tuesday, but rather blocked the move while the court case against it proceeds.
However, he did find that the states had a “substantial” likelihood to succeed on the merits of their claim and that they were able to demonstrate a “substantial” threat of irreparable harm.
The ruling is something of a setback for the Biden administration, which had paused issuing new drilling leases on federally-owned land and water while it reviews and reconsiders its current leasing and permitting practices. An Interior Department spokesperson told The Hill via email that the department will abide by the decision while continuing its review.
“We are reviewing the judge’s opinion and will comply with the decision,” the spokesperson said. “The Interior Department continues to work on an interim report that will include initial findings on the state of the federal conventional energy programs, as well as outline next steps and recommendations for the Department and Congress to improve stewardship of public lands and waters, create jobs, and build a just and equitable energy future.”
During the pause — which did not have an end date but was expected to last at least until the end of June — the administration continued to issue new permits on existing leases while existing drilling was able to continue.
While on the campaign trail, President Biden pledged to ban new oil and gas permitting on public lands and waters, but since taking office, his administration has not said whether it ultimately hopes to do so.
The Energy Department’s statistics agency found in a March analysis that the pause is expected to have “no effects” until 2022. But in his decision, Doughty argued that the states will eventually face losses as a result.
“Even though existing leases are proceeding, the fact that new oil and gas leases on federal lands and in federal waters are paused will ultimately result in losses to Plaintiff States which they will likely not be able to recover,” he wrote.
The pause sparked significant backlash from Republicans as well as the oil and gas industry. Many of these opponents celebrated Tuesday’s decision and called for the administration to lift the pause entirely.
“This decision is a victory for the rule of law and American energy workers,” said a statement from Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.).
“The president’s illegal ban has hurt workers and deprived Wyoming and other states of a principal source of revenue that they use for public education. President Biden should immediately rescind his punishing ban,” he said.
Reprint. Dem congressman chides progressives for provoking anti-Semitism by calling Israel ‘apartheid state. Feels good to see someone from the left bitch slap their own.
A Democraticcongressman called out his progressive colleagues for provoking anti-Semitismby referring to Israelas “a terrorist or apartheid state.”
During a CNN interview on Monday, Rep. Dean Phillips, D-Minn., was asked if he had conversed with any of his fellow progressive lawmakers regarding his previous tweet, which called out their “silence” on condemning anti-Semitic attacks
Phillips, who is Jewish, said he’s “never had to stand up in this way” throughout his life and that “these are the times” his grandparents and great-grandparents cautioned him about growing up.
The Minnesota Democrat said that there was a “problem on the right” regarding anti-Semitism while referencing Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., before noting that America was now “seeing attacks from the left.”
“And just as the former president called COVID the ‘China flu’ — which wrote the tax on Asian-Americans — calling Israel a terrorist state or an apartheid state, to me, is doing the same thing to the Jewish community, which has been persecuted for so many generations,” Phillips said.
The Democratic congressman said it was “time to stand up” and called on his progressive colleagues “to recognize what is at stake here.”
The two-term congressman called out his progressive colleagues on social media for not showing the same amount of “vigor” in pushing back against anti-Semitic attacks as they do other “areas of activism.” The tweet, posted last week, was seen as a thinly-veiled shot at the “Squad,” – the small group of progressive House members who have a history of making anti-Israel comments.
An effort to recall Governor Gretchen Whitmer can proceed, but it’ll be an uphill climb to get enough signatures to get the recall effort on the ballot.
The bipartisan Board of State Canvassers unanimously approved the petition language Monday.
Albion resident Chad Baase is behind the petition.
Reprint. Takes two to replace Rush Limbaugh. Yes we will see two gentlemen replacing Rush.
Conservative talk radio icon Rush Limbaugh’s replacements have finally been announced, and are being dubbed, “an evolution of the show with fresh voices.”
Clay Travis, a 42-year-old sports commentator and analyst with Fox Sports, and Buck Sexton, a 39-year-old political commentator and former CIA officer, will come together to host “The Clay Travis & Buck Sexton Show” from noon to 3 p.m. EST on weekdays, distributor Premiere Networks confirmed Thursday.
“We’re not going to replace Rush Limbaugh, we’re going to have an evolution of the show with fresh voices — those that grew up on Rush and admired him,” Premiere Networks president Julie Talbott said in a statement.
News of the new program, which will begin airing June 21, was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.
Speaking about the program, and the big shoes Limbaugh left to fill, Travis and Sexton both said in statements that they would usher in the next generation of talk radio.
“Rush’s connection with his audience is one of the primary legacies of his show,” Travis said. “I also think Buck and I have the unique ability to offer a perspective that many people in their 20s and 30s are desperate to hear.”
“The most dominant talk radio hosts have been from one generation; Clay and I represent the next phase. We’re going to bring the perspective of two guys who see a country they’re deeply worried about, and a massive audience that needs people who will speak for them,” Sexton added.
Limbaugh passed at age 70 from lung cancer in February, was still being listened to on a daily basis by his listeners after his passing.
Over his decades on the airwaves, Limbaugh galvanized listeners with his blunt assessments of the social and political landscape and his penchant for sarcasm.
His work influenced the likes of Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly and countless other conservative commentators.
House Democrats said it gives money to “governments who desperately need funds.”
But it also gives lots of money to people who don’t need funds.
Maryland, which even The Washington Post admits is “flush with cash,” got enough extra money to pass a budget that “hands bonuses to every state worker.”
Even Atherton, California, where the median home price is $6 million, got Heroes Act money.
“There was no means test!” complains Lisa Conyers, author of Welfare for the Rich, in my latest video.
Omni Hotels & Resorts received $68 million in loans. Major airlines got $25 billion in loans from the CARES Act.
“Who wouldn’t like to play Santa Claus?” asks Conyers. “Who wouldn’t like to just be able to give everybody some money?”
Welfare for the rich didn’t start with coronavirus relief bills. Politicians have done it for years, and a pandemic didn’t stop them.
Nevada politicians gave Oakland Raiders owner Mark Davis $750 million for a new stadium. A stadium designer says Davis insisted on the very best, including natural grass on a field that “moves in and out of the building in one piece.”
Cool. But why didn’t Davis pay for it himself?
“I’m not a billionaire,” he said.
But he is… The team is valued at more than $3 billion, and Davis and his mom co-own 47% of it.
Politicians screw taxpayers to build stadiums for lots of rich people.
Minnesota gave the Minnesota Vikings $348 million for their new stadium. Santa Clara, California, gave the San Francisco 49ers $114 million, plus $850 million in loans. Team co-owner Denise York and her family are worth $3.5 billion, says Forbes. She ought to fund her own stadium.
“The taxpayers often vote for this stuff,” I say to Conyers, “so they must like it.”
“They’re promised there’s going to be all these jobs,” she replies, “not only at the stadium but at the hotels that are going to rise up around the stadium.”
Politicians always promise that public investment will return more in benefits to taxpayers. But it’s not true…
A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City found new stadiums bring in about $40 million in jobs and tax benefits, much less than the $188 million that taxpayers pay.
Handouts to other corporations fare no better.
Ohio politicians gave General Motors millions in tax credits to keep its Lordstown plant open. GM then closed the plant. Politicians let GM keep a third of the money.
Wisconsin gave nearly $3 billion in tax breaks to Foxconn because it promised to create 13,000 jobs. Now the company promises to create only 1,454.
“If you look at the cost of each job, it was a million dollars,” Conyers points out.
Actually, it was more than a million.
Politicians often justify this corporate welfare by saying, “We didn’t give cash, just tax breaks.”
But “If some big company is in that town and they are not paying property tax, that means every other taxpayer is covering for them,” Conyers points out. “(F)ire departments still have to be paid for. Police departments still have to be paid for. Schools still have to be paid for!”
Then there’s the farm subsidy scam.
Both Republicans and Democrats eagerly give your money to agribusiness, even though farmers are now richer than the average American.
The politicians claim the handouts are not a payoff for political contributions but to “make sure there’s enough food to go around,” since “farmers have no control over price fluctuations and the weather.”
But that’s absurd. Other businesses adjust to price fluctuations and weather. America doesn’t subsidize fruit and vegetable farmers – yet we have plenty of fruits and vegetables.
The politicians claim they want to help “small family farms,” but they give 90% of the subsidies to the biggest farms.
Such welfare for the rich persists because, years ago, politicians voted for a handout, and once they start giving your money away, they never stop.
“I’m an American taxpayer,” says Conyers. “I don’t understand why money is leaving my pocket and going into the pocket of somebody who is wealthy.”
In the face of most Democrats’ opposition, US Steel cancels a billion-dollar investment.
BRADDOCK, Pennsylvania — Exactly two years ago, U.S. Steel Corporation announced that the company would turn its Mon Valley operations into a key source of lightweight steel for the automotive industry.
At the time, local leaders and company officials called the investment “transformational.”
Statue of Joe Magarac, a folktale steelworker who could bend steel with his bare hands, in front of the 148-year-old Edgar Thomson Works.
(Shannon Venditti / Washington Examiner)
It involved a whopping $1.5 billion upgrade to its Mon Valley Works. This included an upgrade of the Edgar Thomson Works in Braddock, the Irvin Plant in West Mifflin, and Clairton Coke Works, with technology and improvements that would have provided cleaner air for all three communities where the plants are located, as well as good-paying jobs that would have provided prosperity for the region for decades.
On Friday, U.S. Steel said after months of tug-of-war with the Allegheny County Health Department, it is canceling the $1.5 billion upgrade and idling three batteries at Clairton Coke Works by 2023.
U.S. Steel said in a statement that a dragged-out delay from Allegheny County officials for permitting the project contributed to their decision, along with the new direction that the company is taking to focus on sustainability.
Allegheny County chief executive Rich Fitzgerald, a city Democrat, said he was “blindsided by the news.”
Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, also a Democrat, said he was simply devastated. “It is heartbreaking,” said Fetterman, whose home is across the street from the sprawling 148-year-old Edgar Thomson Works that hugs the Monongahela River.
Local economic development forecasters estimate over 1,000 direct jobs will be lost. Countless more support jobs that would have facilitated the build-out are also gone.
Jeff Nobers, the president of Pittsburgh Works, an economic group made up of officials in manufacturing, steel, energy, and labor unions, said the unknown costs and future implications due to this decision are formidable and long-lasting. “We have to be thinking about what manufacturers who were looking to locate here are thinking,” he said. “Do they look at the climate here and wonder if it is worth it? Well, that is a problem too.”
Local elected officials are of several minds on this project. Most of them were just hoping it would fly under the radar of the climate justice warriors and go up without notice. That was never going to happen. The rest fully backed its demise because of their views on climate change.
One exception has been Fetterman, the progressive populist Democrat who is seeking his party’s nomination to run for the Senate seat being vacated by Republican Pat Toomey in 2022. He was a vocal supporter of the project, which sometimes placed him at odds within his own party’s ranks. His support created a strange alliance for him with Republican state lawmakers such as Allegheny County state Sen. Devlin Robinson and the state senate majority leader, Kim Ward.
Ward said that although she does not agree with Fetterman on much, “I sure do on this one.”
Robinson agreed. “The constant rhetoric attacking manufacturing in this country is going to impact jobs,” he said. “That is not something to worry about in the future — it is happening right in front of us.”
Critics of the closure also point to the constant drumbeat coming from local environmental justice nonprofit groups and reporting organizations funded by elite, left-wing foundations such as the Heinz Endowments. These, they argue, are contributing to a hostile business climate.
The Edgar Thomson Works, named after a Pennsylvania Railroad president, was built by Andrew Carnegie in the 1870s on the site of an old French and Indian War battlefield.
U.S. Steel also told its investors that they are reallocating capital to other places — which means all of the work that was going to go here is likely going someplace where bureaucrats are less beholden to (or aligned with) environmentalists.
Fetterman calls the moment an opportunity lost: “We could have made the safest, greenest steel in the world right here in Braddock. We could have secured thousands of good-paying union jobs.”
Now, that opportunity is gone.
President Joe Biden said in his joint speech in front of Congress that there there’s no reason that steel can’t be continually manufactured in the United States and by doing it in a safe and green way, in a environmentally efficient way. Biden even riffed, “There’s no reason the blades for wind turbines can’t be built in Pittsburgh instead of Beijing.”
“Well, that’s what this investment was about,” said Robinson. “This $1.5 billion was about making steel in a more environmentally friendly way. But the current environment right now is so hostile to manufacturing, manufacturers know making things in America is not a viable option. Especially not now, and especially not into the future, where they’re going to see a return on their investment.”
Manufacturers may have to relocate to places where there are no unions or outside the country. This makes hollow Biden’s promise to protect union jobs and bring back manufacturing — and it will be doubly hollow if he looks the other way when things like this happen.
This conflict between manufacturing and environmentalism is also going to place Biden at odds with both. Biden argues that a decarbonizing economy will create millions of jobs. Here, however, it meant zero jobs created and perhaps many destroyed.
