What the hell is it going to take for Maine’s Republican Sen. Susan Collins to stop being the “moderate” darling of the traditional news media and clueless Senate Democrats? That perception of her as a good faith negotiator, willing to put aside partisan politics, is completely skewed. We already saw that from her on Supreme Court confirmations. But trusting her on elections reforms—which Senate Democrats are doing is just downright dangerous.
Collins is leading a group of bipartisan senators looking at how to reform the Electoral Count Act, with the blessing of Mitch McConnell. Which in reality means McConnell’s faithful tool Collins worked to peel Democrats Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema away from the necessary Freedom to Vote/John Lewis Voting Rights Act. The ECA governs election certifications by Congress, the process Trump was attempting to use in his coup. The coup attempt for which he was impeached by the House. Collins was one of seven Senate Republicans to vote to convict him.
So Collins thought he was guilty of inciting the Jan. 6 insurrection, and she is ostensibly attempting to tighten up the ECA to make it harder to use Congress to do a coup. But she’s also not ruling out supporting Trump for another run in 2024. Read that again. Susan Collins will not categorically say Trump is unfit for office.
Collins was on “This Week” on ABC Sunday, and when George Stephanopoulos her about Trump, she demurred. He even prefaced his question with this: “As you’re working on this reform, former President Trump is out on the campaign trail. He was out in Texas last night suggesting he may pardon those—if he were elected in 2024—those who were part of the Jan. 6 riots.” And when he asked, “Can you imagine any circumstances where you could support his election in 2024?” she wouldn’t say no, there was no circumstance in which she would support him.
Susan Collins won't shut the door on supporting Trump in 2024 even after voting for his conviction following his second impeachment trial pic.twitter.com/tWfNt57kYv
“Well, we’re a long ways from 2024,” she dithered. “But let me say this, I do not think the president should have made—that President Trump should have made that pledge to do pardons. We should let the judicial process proceed.” Wow, way to go out on a limb there. “Why can’t you rule out supporting him in 2024?” Stephanopoulos pressed (sort of). “Well, certainly it’s not likely given the many other qualified candidates that we have that have expressed interest in running. So it’s very unlikely,” she answered.
She. Can’t. Say. No. More. Trump.
For her pains, Trump issued a statement calling her “Wacky” for looking at ECA reforms. They deserve each other.
Since we’re here and it’s Collins and no Democrat should ever, ever trust her, how about another load of bullshit from the same interview? Stephanopoulos asks her about Biden’s potential Supreme Court pick and whether she’s open to supporting them, a question she uses to launch an attack on Biden.
“I would welcome the appointment of a Black female to the court,” she says. But. “But the way that the president has handled this nomination has been clumsy at best. It adds to the further perception that the court is a political institution like Congress when it is not supposed to be.” Yeah. Coming from the person who is personally responsible for the Brett Kavanaugh stain seeping into the SCOTUS fabric. But “isn’t it exactly what Senator Reagan did when he said he would appoint a woman to the Supreme Court?” Stephanopoulos asks. “Isn’t it exactly what President Trump did when he said he would appoint a woman to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg?”
What follows is the Susan Collins version of, “I did my own research.”
“Actually, this isn’t exactly the same. I’ve looked at what was done in both cases. And what President Biden did was as a candidate, make this pledge. And that helped politicize the entire nomination process.”
Wrong. Oct. 15, 1980, three weeks before the presidential election: “Ronald Reagan, striving to refute charges that he is insensitive to women’s rights, said today he would name a woman to ‘one of the first Supreme Court vacancies in my administration.’”
Of course, Stephanopoulos didn’t challenge her deceit. If he did that, she might not come back on his show next Sunday. And he can't have that. They all have to keep up the pretense of a “moderate” Republican and her promises of a bipartisan unicorn.
Republican Party leader and traitor to the nation Donald Trump continues to test new rally waters in anticipation of a repeat presidential bid. On Saturday the delusional narcissist made no particular effort to hide his disgust for the law and for those who would hold him to it, delivering an ugly, unhinged, and unabashedly fascist speech to a crowd of like-minded traitors.
His most newsworthy proclamation was a vow to pardon the seditionists of the January 6 insurrection. "If I run and I win, we will treat those people from Jan. 6 fairly."
"And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons. Because they are being treated so unfairly."
BREAKING: President Trump promises to PARDON Jan. 6 prisoners if he runs and wins in 2024 pic.twitter.com/teYbYNBcuB
It is not immediately clear if the traitor, who gathered and incited a crowd to "march" to the U.S. Capitol on that day and hour as part of a multi-pronged plan for his Republican Party to nullify his presidential election loss while using "emergency" presidential powers to either militarily oversee a "new" election or simply declare himself the legitimate winner, is promising a blanket pardon of all those involved in the violence. He may also be vowing to use presidential pardons to erase legal consequences for only his own inner circle of co-conspirators, just as he used it to immunize those allies when he last had the power to do so.
The intent of the message is clear either way. Trump is allying himself with those that helped him carry out his seditious—and deadly—insurrection, and is dropping promises of "pardons" as encouragement to his allies to keep fighting to block probes into the violence. Stonewall the prosecutions and refuse to cooperate with investigators, the traitorous criminal hints, and he will make your troubles go away again when he is returned to power.
But Trump went even farther. Citing the (many) investigations against him for crimes ranging from the previous insurrection to the pressure on Georgia officials to "find" new votes to a lifelong pattern of financial fraud, the fascist leader pushed his fascist supporters to respond to any potential indictment against him by taking to the streets.
"If these radical, vicious, racist prosecutors do anything wrong or illegal, I hope we are going to have in this country the biggest protest we have ever had in Washington D.C., in New York, in Atlanta and elsewhere, because our country and our elections are corrupt. They're corrupt."
After ranting about the prosecutors investigating him, Trump calls the prosecutors racist and says if they do anything illegal, he hopes there are massive protests in DC, New York, and Atlanta pic.twitter.com/RnY6F5OJNv
It is the hallmark of a fascist leader and his party: The claim that prosecution of his own crimes, or the crimes of his violent supporters, proves only that the whole nation was "corrupt" and needed to be remade. Trump is wedging racist in there because, both in Georgia and in New York, the head investigators of his crimes are Black.
Far from being deterred by the violence of his attempted insurrection, Trump is simultaneously promising to erase the crimes of those who attempted to topple the government on his behalf and pressing his Republican followers to mount even "bigger" street actions to keep his own criminal behind out of a prison cell. The man continues to betray his country in every way it is possible to betray it, and all of it is centered only around himself and his own desires.
In his previous rounds of presidential pardons, Trump pardoned those who committed war crimes; those who treated immigrants with illegal cruelty; those who obstructed investigations on his behalf; those who acted as agents of foreign powers. His pardons were all aimed at neutralizing prosecutions of those who did illegal things in service of racist, xenophobic, or Trump-promoting ends.
The Republican leader's promise to "pardon" those who engaged in violent insurrection on his behalf made barely a ripple on the Sunday shows or among the Republicans still loyal to that insurrection. Trump is overtly thumping for future seditious acts, and the Republican Party, purged of anyone who is not a willing accessory to even violent crimes, has little to say about it.
As gutless as ever, Sen. Lindsey Graham will only allow that it is "inappropriate" to promise pardons for insurrectionists. But only that; he will go no farther, lest he say something too bold and lose favor with the pro-fascist base.
"I think it is inappropriate" -- Lindsey Graham on Trump promising pardons to those convicted of crimes connected to the January 6 attack on Congress (Graham then tries to bothsides it by bringing up Kamala Harris) pic.twitter.com/Hr6Sgz8RPp
And as spineless as ever, Sen. Susan Collins—one of the few Republicans who dared vote to impeach Trump after the insurrection, will only allow that she is "very unlikely" to support Trump as future presidential candidate.
Susan Collins won't shut the door on supporting Trump in 2024 even after voting for his conviction following his second impeachment trial pic.twitter.com/tWfNt57kYv
So not even orchestrating an attempted coup is sufficient reason to fully and completely rule out support for the plotter? Truly, there may never be another political figure as relentlessly rudderless as this one.
More of the Sunday show debate was spent on allowing the defenders of insurrection to sniff about the alleged impropriety of Biden's promise to appoint a Black woman to the Supreme Court than was spent on asking those same Republicans to stand against Trump's visions of mass riots and promised pardons for insurrection.
The Sunday shows are still pointedly neutral when it comes to the choice between peaceful democracy and violence-led fascism. They do not care. Nobody involved cares. They will book the same guests to tell the same lies and support the same crimes from now until the end of the republic, and not a single host will stand against such violence if it means losing interview access to those backing it.
Trump's latest rally speeches are clear-cut attacks on the very fabric of the nation. He insists that elections are "corrupt," leading the entire Republican Party into similar rejections of our democracy's validity. He insists that those who investigate his alleged wrongdoing—up to and including violent insurrection—are "corrupt," and promises to immunize those who ally with them against the institutions that would prosecute them for such crimes.
He is a fascist-minded, mostly-delusional traitor to the republic. All those who cheer for him are the same. Trump himself appears to believe that it would be better to plunge the nation into a new civil war than recognize either the validity of his last election loss or the validity of a new one, and he has nearly all Republican Party officials and lawmakers as allies in the effort.
It is impossibly corrupt, all of it, and historians continue to scream that this is precisely how democracies are toppled. With a lazy, dull-witted press; with a party that emphasizes good corruption over bad prosecution; with a base that does not give a damn about any of it, because they are single-mindedly obsessed over the notion that the nebulous other is oppressing them and for that, must be punished.
There is no way this does not end in a tidal wave of political violence. And that, too, will likely be downplayed by Sunday show hosts looking to book those who would ally with it.
"After a visit to a small business in D.C., President Biden stopped in to a local ice cream shop to get himself a treat. What kind of ice cream, you're wondering? Intrepid reporters report that it was two scoops, light-colored flavor on the bottom, darker ice cream on top. Or as Mitch McConnell would describe it: dark ice cream and ice cream."
—Stephen Colbert
"Musician Kid Rock released a song this week that criticizes coronavirus restrictions. Oh, buddy, that's not why people are staying six feet away from you."
—Seth Meyers
Continued…
You are now below the fold. You fool. We warned you.
"Senate Republicans lined up to shake Kyrsten Sinema's hand after she voted against changing the filibuster to pass voting rights. Ah, the U.S. Senate: keeping Black folks down with a quiet handshake since 1787."
—Michael Che, SNL
"The House [Jan. 6] select committee received a load of documents that the former president sued to try to prevent them from seeing. One of those documents is a draft of a very damning executive order that would've directed the National Guard to seize voting machines after the election. It was a last-ditch effort to keep Trump in power—a Sieg Heil Mary pass, if you will."
—Jimmy Kimmel
“This week, Justice Stephen Breyer announced his plans to retire from the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, Mitch McConnell announced a new rule that you actually can't replace a Supreme Court judge the same year they replace M&Ms characters.”
—Samantha Bee
It’s a slippery slope from woke M&M’s to Same-Skittle marriage.
"President Joe Biden was caught on a hot mic calling Fox News reporter Peter Doocy a 'stupid son of a bitch' when pressed about inflation at a White House event. To be fair, being a 'stupid son' is basically how Peter Doocy got his job."
—Trevor Noah
"Kyle Rittenhouse is petitioning the court for the return of his rifle so he can destroy it. I dunno—trying to get your own memorabilia back is how they finally got O.J."
—Colin Jost, SNL
And now, our feature presentation…
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Cheers and Jeers for Friday, January 28, 2022
Note: Big blizzard hitting New England tomorrow. If you’re in the strike zone of the latest “bomb cyclone,” please follow the proper safety protocol: make sure your neighborhood squirrels have plenty of almonds, blankets and propane heaters first, then stock up on your own emergency needs second. The almonds are really especially important, so do those first, like right now, it’s that important. Thank you.
—The definitely human emergency manager and not a bunch of squirrels standing on top of each other under a raincoat trying to look like a human emergency manager
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By the Numbers:
3 days!!!
Days 'til Groundhog Day: 5
Days 'til National Bubble Wrap Appreciation Day: 3
Estimated level of child poverty in January, up from 12% because the child tax credit wasn't extended by Congress: 17%
Expected percent among Black and Latino children: 25%
Increase in cigarette sales in 2020, the first increase since 2000: 0.4%
Estimated number if households that acquired a dog or cat during the pandemic: 23 million
CHEERS to clamping the vise of justice on the noggins of tyranny. Here's a quick roundup of where things stand with the various bad people who lately can't sleep at night without breaking out into at least one cold sweat:
» More insurrectionists are getting arrested, charged and sentenced, thanks in no small measure to the patriotic nerds doing facial recognition sleuthing and turning their leads over to the feds.
» Congressman Matt Gaetz, an alleged sex trafficker of minors, isn’t acting quite so smug today after a BFF of his copped a plea and is now spilling his beans to investigators.
» Rudy Giuliani was identified as the principle architect of the plot to swap out the real 2020 electors from seven swing states with a slate of fake ones. The fake electors who went along with him are now being investigated by the Justice Department.
» The Thing from Perv-A-Lago and his spawn are up to their necks in grand juries, DA subpoenas in multiple states investigating real estate fraud and election fraud, and the giant flaming eyeball of the House January 6 committee. Their pleas to stop the proceedings and let them get away with their crimey stuff are falling on deaf ears.
» 12-year-old Congressman Madison Cawthorn, who never met a democratic institution or minor personal inconvenience he didn’t compare to the Holocaust, may be disqualified from running for reelection if his accusers can make their case that he helped incite the January 6 insurrection. Which he did.
» And seven school districts in Virginia are suing their new cultist governor for turning schools into institutions of human sacrifice by nullifying their sensible Covid protection rules.
As we well know by now, the judicial system moves at a crawl…right up until the moment it doesn't. (Even on weekends.) So keep your ears to the pavement. And if you see Merrick Garland tearing through the streets in his giant modified snowplow of justice, give him a wide berth.
CHEERS to the Biden recovery. Because it was so positive, it was of course like playing a game of Where's Waldo? to find the news that our economy was the envy of the civilized world in 2021, with gross domestic product climbing to 5.7 percent overall and an eye-popping 7 percent in the fourth quarter as Democrats fixed supply chain issues and Americans enjoyed a happier holiday than the previous year:
“It just goes to show that the U.S. economy has learned to adapt to the new variants and continues to produce,'' said Beth Ann Bovino, chief economist at Standard &Poor's Global Ratings. […]
Damn, Republican presidents suck at getting it up and keeping it up.
For the final three months of 2021, consumer spending rose at a more muted 3.3% annual pace. But private investment rocketed 32% higher, boosted by a surge in business inventories as companies stocked up to meet higher customer demand. Rising inventories, in fact, accounted for 71% of the fourth-quarter growth.
In a statement, President Joe Biden said, “We are finally building an American economy for the 21st century, with the fastest economic growth in nearly four decades, along with the greatest year of job growth in American history."
JEERS to premature descents. On January 28, 1986—good lord, 36 years ago—the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded 73 seconds after liftoff, killing all seven crew members, including civilian teacher Christa McAuliffe. I'm guessing that if you were more than toddler-age, you remember exactly where you were when you heard about it. I was in the Otterbein College (Westerville, Ohio) campus center at 11:38am, and can still conjure up the queasy feeling that set in when I realized what had happened. A stunned crowd of students and faculty gathered around the big-screen TV and just...watched. Lest we forget these were the heroes on board that day:
Teacher-in-Space Christa McAuliffe and astronauts Gregory Jarvis, Judith Resnik, Mission Commander Dick Scobee, astronaut Ronald McNair, pilot Mike Smith, and astronaut Ellison Onizuka.
Today folks from the Challenger Center and elsewhere, along with family members of the crew, commemorated the tragedy, starkly reminding the world that it takes off-the-charts courage, brains and skill to put yourself through the rigors of space flight. Which pretty much explains why I blog for a living.
CHEERS to, like, freeing your mind, man. Tomorrow is Freethinkers Day, which celebrates those who believe that truth should be formed on the basis of logic, reason, and empiricism, rather than authority, tradition, or religion. Noted freethinkers include Thomas Paine, Albert Einstein, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and anyone who has ever shouted, “The Fox News, it burns!”
CHEERS to the first ringy-dingy. On January 28, 1878, the commercial telephone switchboard made its national debut in New Haven, Connecticut. The first customers were Amanda Hugginkiss, I.P. Freely and Seymour Butz. We hear the first operator lasted a whole five minutes.
CHEERS to home vegetation. Since our nation is still in the capable hands of Democrats again, we can relax and spend some couch time with the teevee this weekend, starting tonight with Chris Hayes and Rachel Maddow telling us why we shouldn’t be spending our weekend relaxing on the couch. (Spoiler alert: Because our republic is being destroyed by pro-Russian morons.)
Willem finally adds “SNL Host” to his meager resume tomorrow night.
Or you can catch a new Penn & Teller: Fool Us starting at 8 on the CW. Bill Maher's guests tonight (just for the record, not because we watch him anymore) on Real Time are ACLU executive director Ira Glasser, Matt Welch of Reason, and star of Trump's first impeachment hearing Fiona Hill. Director Kenneth Branagh talks about his acclaimed movie Belfast on The Graham Norton Show at 11 on BBC America.
The new movies and home videos, new and old, are all reviewed here at Rotten Tomatoes. The season premiere of The Great Chocolate Showdown, during which contestants “take on the art of tempering chocolate,” airs tomorrow night at 8 on The CW. Willem Dafoe makes his Saturday Night Live hosting debut tomorrow night, with Katy Perry on backing vocals. The NBA schedule is here and the NHL schedule is here. Meanwhile the Superb Owl competitors will be determined Sunday when the Bengals face the Chiefs for the AFC title (3pm, CBS) and the 49ers take on the Rams for the NFC Championship (6:30, Fox, so no Simpsons or Family Guy this week). As always, I'm putting all my money on whichever team Secretariat is on. And on 60 Minutes: reports on great white sharks and Yellowstone Park’s wolves.
Now here's your Sunday morning lineup:
Face the Nation: TBA
We recommend you watch this on Sunday instead.
This Week: Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL); Sen. Susan Collins (Cult-ME); former HHS Secretary Donna Shalala.
Meet the Press: Sens. Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Rob Portman (Cult-OH); Governor Phil Murphy (D-NJ); Gov. Asa Hutchinson (Cult-AR).
CNN's State of the Union: Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ); Sen. James Risch (Cult-ID); Governor Chris Sununu (Cult-NH).
Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: Sen. Tom Cotton (Cult-AR).
Happy viewing!
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Ten years ago in C&J: January 28, 2012
CHEERS to today's boring correction. According to Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank, President Obama's State of the Union address was "an uninspiring speech delivered with a dismal result." Oh Noes!!! A DISMAL result!!! But the public begs to differ: "91 percent of those who watched the speech approved of the proposals Mr. Obama put forth during his remarks." We're sure Mr. Milbank forgives the American people for interfering with his beltway narrative.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to "32." Make sure you take a moment Sunday to say Happy Birthday (or, to use his dialect, "Happy buhthday") to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who turns 140. He was far from perfect, as all presidents have been: turning away Jews fleeing Nazi Germany, the internment camps, the womanizing. But he was a force of nature who didn’t let polio stop him as he charged headlong into fighting the depression and wars on multiple fronts in Europe and Asia, while passing reforms that made life better for ordinary Americans. Says William Ridings and Stuart McIver in their book Rating the Presidents (where FDR sits at #2, just below Lincoln):
Roosevelt is praised most often for his role in preserving the American capitalist system at a time when many countries were opting for fascism.
Given the dire crises he was forced to confront, perhaps the highest praise from the poll is "the right man in the right place at the right time." [...]
Others praise him for stopping Hitler—and shudder to think what might have been if a less-effective president had been at the helm in those dangerous days.
The lunatics on the right try mightily to rewrite history by insisting that the New Deal was a failure. Never mind that laws enacted in the 1930s—chipped away at though they were—helped prevent our 2008 and 2020 Great Recessions from turning into all-out depressions. Pay your respects here. And never let anyone forget the difference between the parties, as defined by Roosevelt himself: Democrats say we have nothing to fear but fear itself, Republicans say we have nothing to fear but everything but fear itself.
P.S. It's also Dick Cheney's birthday Sunday. He turns 666. Again.
Have a great weekend. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
House Republicans are demanding transcripts of a call between President Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky about a possible Russian invasion of the country be released after disputed reports over the substance of the conversation.
CNN initially reported that a senior Ukrainian official described the talk between Biden and Zelensky as “long and frank” but that it “did not go well.”
CNN reporter Alexander Marquardt, late Thursday, tweeted alarming quotes provided by the Ukrainian official.
“A Russian invasion is now virtually certain once the ground freezes, Biden said to Zelensky, a senior Ukrainian official told [CNN reporter Matthew Chance],” he wrote.
“Kyiv could be ‘sacked,’ Russian forces may attempt to occupy it, ‘prepare for impact’, Biden said, according to this official.”
A Russian invasion is now virtually certain once the ground freezes, Biden said to Zelensky, a senior Ukrainian official told @mchancecnn. Kyiv could be “sacked,” Russian forces may attempt to occupy it, “prepare for impact”, Biden said, according to this official.
The characterization of the phone call was immediately disputed by the White House and the Ukrainian government, according to Newsweek.
National Security Council spokesperson Emily Horne described the CNN report based on a Ukrainian official’s comments as “completely false.”
This is not true. President Biden said that there is a distinct possibility that the Russians could invade Ukraine in February. He has previously said this publicly & we have been warning about this for months. Reports of anything more or different than that are completely false. https://t.co/chkFOhwWHn
Horne would later tell CNN that “anonymous sources are ‘leaking’ falsehoods.”
A spokesman for Zelensky also posted to Facebook that the accounts were “completely false.”
A readout of the call on the White House website makes no mention of any dire warnings to Ukraine, instead indicating that Biden “reaffirmed” to Zelensky that the United States would “respond decisively if Russia further invades Ukraine.”
House Republicans though, challenged the White House to clear the air by demanding they release the actual transcript of the call.
They added a video of Biden in 2019 calling on then-President Trump to “release the transcript of the call” between him and Zelensky, a call that led to the former president’s first impeachment in 2019.
The hashtag ‘#ReleaseTheTranscript’ began trending and was the number one leading topic on Twitter Friday morning.
Releasing the transcript of Biden’s call with Zelensky seems like a logical step. The last thing all parties involved need is reckless and possibly false comments by the President escalating tensions with nuclear-armed Russia.
BREAKING: We have recovered the Ukraine call report that @JakeTapper and CNN just deleted
The controversy comes as experts are warning of a nuclear exchange should Russia and the U.S. come to blows.
“As Russian troops bear down on Ukraine and the United States prepares its own military buildup in Eastern Europe, concerns are growing across the ideological spectrum that the standoff could inadvertently escalate into the unthinkable: nuclear war,” Politico reports.
The column cites “current and former officials and experts on both sides of the Atlantic” who worry about ‘miscalculations’ and ‘stumbling into nuclear confrontation.’
Is there anything at stake here that could justify even the remote chance of nuclear war?
Shortly after Biden was sworn into office, dozens of House Democrats quietly called on President Biden to relinquish sole control over the country’s nuclear arsenal and the ability to launch a strike using those weapons.
Nearly three dozen House Democrats on Monday called on Biden to relinquish his sole authority to launch nuclear weapons, in the latest appeal to reform the command-and-control structure so that no single person can initiate a nuclear war https://t.co/AOIHaYf1b4pic.twitter.com/OSKJ64d3cW
General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, assured House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that in the waning days of the Trump presidency, a President couldn’t launch a nuclear attack alone.
The State Department in November said “all options are on the table and there’s a toolkit that includes a whole range of options” in how to respond to Russia’s troop buildup near Ukraine’s border.
Republican Representative Claudia Tenney of New York is calling for President Biden to be impeached following the release of police video showing illegal immigrants being flown by federal contractors into an airport in New York in the dead of night.
The Political Insider reported Thursday on the bombshell video footage released by former Westchester County Executive and current Republican gubernatorial candidate Rob Astorino, which he obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request.
The video shows federal contractors explaining to a police officer in charge of security at the facility that the illegal immigrant flights, which have reportedly been conducted at the Westchester County Airport since August, are to be “on the down-low.”
“The government is betraying the American people,” one contractor can be heard telling a police officer.
EXCLUSIVE FOOTAGE: Government contractors admit to flying illegal immigrants to smaller airports to keep the flights on the “down low” and hidden from the public. pic.twitter.com/BXA0NHr6Ue
Tenney (R-NY) voiced her outrage over the video in an appearance on “Fox and Friends” Thursday.
“This is a complete, aggravated dereliction of duty, which is why last night on Twitter I called for Joe Biden to be impeached and removed,” she demanded.
“His primary obligation as the commander-in-chief and president of the United States is to enforce our laws, to live up to his oath, to enforce our border security and to tell the truth to the American people.”
Tenney did, in fact, take to social media to demand the impeachment of President Biden upon viewing the video.
“President Biden should resign or face removal by impeachment for this repeated and aggravated violation of his oath of office to protect the American homeland and its citizens,” she tweeted.
Representative Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY), in the same interview, accused President Biden of being in violation of federal law for flying and releasing illegal immigrants into New York.
The congresswoman said aiding and abetting illegal immigration is a violation of the law.
“And you have it coming from the president of the United States,” she pointed out. “It is completely unacceptable.”
President Biden should resign or face removal by impeachment for this repeated and aggravated violation of his oath of office to protect the American homeland and its citizens. https://t.co/WRju67z7Pz
Astorino, in a separate interview with Fox News, concurs with the illegality of what is being seen in the aforementioned video.
“These people are being relocated to places like Westchester, Long Island, suburbs, and other states, and nobody is informed,” Astorino explained.
“The communities that are affected, and we’re paying the bill on this. The taxpayers, nobody is informed,” he continued. “The federal government literally is breaking the law.”
The bombshell police video comes as statistics released by the CBP show a Biden administration unable or unwilling to get border crossings under control.
According to reports, there were 178,840 illegal immigrants apprehended at the border in December, breaking the previous record under DHS for that month by over 100,000.
All told, nearly 2 million illegal immigrants have been apprehended at the border since Biden took office just over one year ago.
And it’s about to get worse.
According to Reuters, border officials are expecting as many as 9,000 border encounters per day by the spring – nearly 40% more than last year’s peak, which averaged 6,500 apprehensions per day.
US border officials are prepping for as many as 9,000 border arrests per day by the spring, two DHS officials told Reuters, an increase that could strain resources.
In July 2021 – the peak of last year’s rise – daily migrant arrests averaged about 6,500.https://t.co/OuC1zQbDHH
Prior to the shocking airport video, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) argued that the humanitarian crisis at the border and the current administration’s “decision to just defy immigration laws” are grounds for impeachment.
“I think there are potentially multiple grounds to consider for impeachment,” Cruz has said. “Probably the most compelling is the utter lawlessness (of) President Biden to enforce the border.”
The midterm races would be crucial should Tenney and other Republicans officially move towards impeachment. A House in GOP control stands a far better chance of successfully approving articles of impeachment against President Biden.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released operational statistics showing the worst December numbers at the border in Department of Homeland Security (DHS) history.
According to the report, there were 178,840 illegal immigrants apprehended at the border in December, breaking the previous record under DHS for that month by over 100,000.
All told, nearly 2 million illegal immigrants have been apprehended at the border since Biden took office just over one year ago.
The numbers also show an increase in illegal border crossing from November which saw 173,620 illegal immigrants apprehended.
BREAKING: @CBP Releases Dec SW Border encounters – 178,840 total – 2% increase from Nov – on pace to shatter FY21… At this point in FY21 – were just 218,036…. Today, we’re already at 518,360 #bordercrisis @FoxNews https://t.co/HVRqHFCZJz
News of the record number of border crossings come as Fox News has obtained exclusive footage of a mass release of single adult illegal immigrants into the country.
“Fox News footage shows several federally contracted buses dropping off dozens of mostly male migrants at a parking garage in Brownsville, Texas,” they report.
After being dropped off at the garage, taxi cabs allegedly arrived and transported the illegal immigrants to a nearby airport where they claimed they were being sent “to destinations including Miami, Houston and Atlanta.”
NEW: We witnessed the federal gov mass releasing single adult migrants, almost all men, at a parking garage in Brownsville. Taxi cabs were then called for them. We followed the taxis to Harlingen airport, where the migrants were dropped off to get on flights around U.S. @FoxNewspic.twitter.com/HcSSwtjMnR
Fox News reporter Bill Melugin states that CBP is not involved in the release shown in the video.
“CBP tells me they had no involvement with these releases,” he tweeted. “An ICE source tells me these were ICE releases.”
Melugin adds that he is waiting on confirmation.
Single adult migrants are supposed to be expelled from the country via Title 42. CBP tells me they had no involvement with these releases. An ICE source tells me these were ICE releases. ICE tells me they are looking into it. I am awaiting further comment from them. @FoxNews
The latest staggering border numbers show that a full year into his term, President Biden is making absolutely no headway in addressing the ever-expanding humanitarian crisis.
In an interview earlier this month, Arizona Department of Public Safety Director Col. Heston Silbert described Biden’s border crisis as “untenable” and “not manageable.”
“Border Patrol’s overwhelmed,” he explained.
Representative Vicky Hartzler (R-MO) described the latest numbers as a “record-breaking (border crisis)” created by “record-breaking incompetence.”
Biden racked up more border crossings in one month than President Trump did in three Decembers combined.
Vice President Kamala Harris is again opting to skip a visit to the southern border and will be traveling instead to Honduras later this month for the inauguration of President-elect Xiomara Castro in an effort to “address the root causes” of illegal immigration.
Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) recently argued that the border crisis and the current administration’s “decision to just defy immigration laws” are grounds for impeachment.
“I think there are potentially multiple grounds to consider for impeachment,” Cruz has said. “Probably the most compelling is the utter lawlessness (of) President Biden to enforce the border.”
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released operational statistics showing the worst December numbers at the border in Department of Homeland Security (DHS) history.
According to the report, there were 178,840 illegal immigrants apprehended at the border in December, breaking the previous record under DHS for that month by over 100,000.
All told, nearly 2 million illegal immigrants have been apprehended at the border since Biden took office just over one year ago.
The numbers also show an increase in illegal border crossing from November which saw 173,620 illegal immigrants apprehended.
BREAKING: @CBP Releases Dec SW Border encounters – 178,840 total – 2% increase from Nov – on pace to shatter FY21… At this point in FY21 – were just 218,036…. Today, we’re already at 518,360 #bordercrisis @FoxNews https://t.co/HVRqHFCZJz
News of the record number of border crossings come as Fox News has obtained exclusive footage of a mass release of single adult illegal immigrants into the country.
“Fox News footage shows several federally contracted buses dropping off dozens of mostly male migrants at a parking garage in Brownsville, Texas,” they report.
After being dropped off at the garage, taxi cabs allegedly arrived and transported the illegal immigrants to a nearby airport where they claimed they were being sent “to destinations including Miami, Houston and Atlanta.”
NEW: We witnessed the federal gov mass releasing single adult migrants, almost all men, at a parking garage in Brownsville. Taxi cabs were then called for them. We followed the taxis to Harlingen airport, where the migrants were dropped off to get on flights around U.S. @FoxNewspic.twitter.com/HcSSwtjMnR
Fox News reporter Bill Melugin states that CBP is not involved in the release shown in the video.
“CBP tells me they had no involvement with these releases,” he tweeted. “An ICE source tells me these were ICE releases.”
Melugin adds that he is waiting on confirmation.
Single adult migrants are supposed to be expelled from the country via Title 42. CBP tells me they had no involvement with these releases. An ICE source tells me these were ICE releases. ICE tells me they are looking into it. I am awaiting further comment from them. @FoxNews
The latest staggering border numbers show that a full year into his term, President Biden is making absolutely no headway in addressing the ever-expanding humanitarian crisis.
In an interview earlier this month, Arizona Department of Public Safety Director Col. Heston Silbert described Biden’s border crisis as “untenable” and “not manageable.”
“Border Patrol’s overwhelmed,” he explained.
Representative Vicky Hartzler (R-MO) described the latest numbers as a “record-breaking (border crisis)” created by “record-breaking incompetence.”
Biden racked up more border crossings in one month than President Trump did in three Decembers combined.
Vice President Kamala Harris is again opting to skip a visit to the southern border and will be traveling instead to Honduras later this month for the inauguration of President-elect Xiomara Castro in an effort to “address the root causes” of illegal immigration.
Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) recently argued that the border crisis and the current administration’s “decision to just defy immigration laws” are grounds for impeachment.
“I think there are potentially multiple grounds to consider for impeachment,” Cruz has said. “Probably the most compelling is the utter lawlessness (of) President Biden to enforce the border.”
Despite the fact that it’s a crime that he’s even in federal prison, Native American rights activist Leonard Peltier is begging for help amid a COVID-19 surge keeping prisoners on unending lockdowns and without booster shots.
“I’m in hell,” Peltier said in a statement to HuffPost, “and there is no way to deal with it but to take it as long as you can.”
Peltier, 77, has been locked-up since 1975, making him the longest-serving political prisoner in U.S. history. He suffers from diabetes and an abdominal aortic aneurysm. He says the current conditions in his high-security facility in Florida, include lack of phone access, regular showers, fresh air, and healthy food
“Left alone and without attention is like a torture chamber for the sick and old,” he said about his imprisonment in USP Coleman I.
According to Peltier’s attorney, Kevin Sharp, Peltier, along with 1,335 inmates at the facility, have been on lockdown since Jan. 11 and those on his cellblock have yet to receive their COVID-19 booster shots—long after the six-month mark.
“In and out of lockdown last year at least meant a shower every third day, a meal beyond a sandwich wet with a little peanut butter — but now with COVID for an excuse, nothing. No phone, no window, no fresh air — no humans to gather — no love ones [sic] voice. No relief,” Peltier wrote.
Health experts have said since the start of the pandemic that inmate conditions are a potential petri dish for the spread of the virus as people are physically unable to separate themselves from one another.
Since the start of his decades-long incarceration, Peltier had denied being involved in a shootout with two plain-clothed FBI agents over a pair of stolen boots at the South Dakota Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in 1975. The shooting left two FBI agents dead and a Native American named Joe Stunz, who was shot in the head by a sniper bullet. His murder has never been investigated.
The FBI quickly focused their investigation on prominent members of the American Indian Movement (AIM), who were camping on the property at the time. They’d been invited there by the Jumping Bull elders, to protect the Nation from the extreme violence on the reservation at that time. Peltier was an AIM member.
Peltier’s trial was a joke. First off, the FBI agents were tied to a goon squad, something that was never introduced in court. Additionally, information about a bullet ballistics test that would have exonerated him, was also never introduced.
Peltier was initially convicted of first-degree murder, but even though that conviction was later thrown out, his sentence was upheld for aiding and abetting a murder.
Assistant U.S. Attorney James Reynolds, who upheld the conviction, and the federal Appeals Court judge who rejected his early appeals, have both since called for his release along with a plethora of high-powered names—Pope Francis, The Dalai Lama, Mother Teresa, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, Muhammad Ali, Robert Redford, Wes Studi, Tantoo Cardinal, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, and Marlon Brando, among many others.
“I write today from a position rare for a former prosecutor: to beseech you to commute the sentence of a man who I helped put behind bars,” Reynolds wrote in July. “With time and the benefit of hindsight, I have realized that the prosecution and continued incarceration of Mr. Peltier was and is unjust. We were not able to prove that Mr. Peltier personally committed any offense on the Pine Ridge Reservation.”
Peltier’s entire testimony was given from people who had been threated or intimidated by the FBI, and they have made sure that he will never see the light of day.
Peltier had a chance for release in 2009, but it would have meant admitting to the murder of two FBI agents, and he refused. His parole was then denied.
“Whatever punishment was meant to be meted out to Leonard has been done. It’s done,” Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva told HuffPost. “The fact that he has held to his innocence shouldn’t be a reason to deny this. He has been consistent about his position from the beginning ― from being arrested to incarcerated to this day.”
“In order to get clemency, you have to get the FBI on board. They have an inherent conflict. You have to get the U.S. Attorney’s Office on board. They lied to get him in prison. They have an inherent conflict. They’re not going to say, ‘Oops, sorry,” Sharp told HuffPost.
Former President Bill Clinton considered clemency, but after surviving his own impeachment hearings, he wouldn’t have wanted to step out and go toe-to-toe with the FBI. Then former President Barack Obama was given Peltier’s case for review and he refused to oppose the FBI. Even former President Donald Trump considered the case but ultimately punted it.
Peltier’s last chance for clemency is from President Joe Biden. Hundreds of thousands of people have signed petitions supporting his release and with Deb Haaland, the first Indigenous Cabinet Secretary, leading the Interior Department, there’s a sliver of hope to save Peltier from dying in prison.
Haaland has been a vocal advocate for Peltier’s case, along with Petuuche Gilbert, president of Indigenous World Association; Norman Patrick Brown, who was among one of the young persons who survived the June 26, 1975 shootout; human rights advocate, Eda Gordon; and Lenny Foster, Peltier’s Spiritual Advisor of over 30 years who is Board member of the International Indian Treaty Council and American Indian Movement.
Even Reynolds has pleaded with Biden to grant Peltier clemency as a step toward healing “the broken relationship” between Native Americans and the U.S. government.
“I urge you to chart a different path in the history of the government’s relationship with its Native people through a show of mercy rather than continued indifference,” he said. “I urge you to take a step towards healing a wound that I had a part in making.”
“Where are our human rights activists? You are hearing from me, and with me, many desperate men and women! They are turning an already harsh environment into an asylum, and for many who did not receive a death penalty, we are now staring down the face of one! Help me, my brothers and sisters, help me my good friends,” Peltier writes.
To learn more about Peltier’s case, go to Leonard’s Defense Committee’s website www.whoisleonardpeltier.info transcripts and other archival material.
Tom Emmer has the hottest political hand in the House GOP right now. And if he can win a sizable majority this fall, he’ll have even more chips to cash in.
Halfway through his second cycle as House Republicans’ campaign chief, Emmer is managing to pull off a remarkable feat in the modern GOP: Even as it fissures over Donald Trump’s checkered legacy, Emmer is popular among its disparate wings. From leadership to conservatives to pro-impeachment centrists, all corners of the party have words of praise for the silver-haired Minnesotan.
It doesn’t hurt that Emmer helped stave off an anticipated loss of seats in 2020, to the surprise of many House Republicans. Now that the National Republican Congressional Committee has even more momentum this fall, with Democrats lining up for the exits ahead of an expected GOP takeover in the midterms, the biggest question may be what comes next for its chief.
Just don’t ask him — yet — how he plans to build on a November win.
“The only thing I have in mind right now is winning a majority. That's it,” Emmer said in an interview. “If you talk to some of my colleagues, I'm sure they told you that I'm a little adamant about staying focused in the moment.”
They did. As House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) put it, “the most important thing Tom's been vocal about is, nobody can get complacent.”
But many of his colleagues are betting Emmer won’t return as NRCC chair; it is unheard-of in recent years for any lawmaker to endure three cycles of the campaign grind. While the 60-year-old former city council member says he isn’t ruling anything out, fellow Republicans believe he’s eyeing the whip position — which could be the House GOP’s first open leadership role in years if the midterms go as expected — or another role in leadership.
The shuffle would go like this (despite Emmer’s disinterest in public drapes-measuring): House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy would become speaker in 2023, and Scalise would ascend to majority leader, leaving a likely crowded race for majority whip.
Joining Emmer as potential whip contenders are Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), the current GOP conference chair; Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), the party’s top Financial Services Committee member; and Rep. Drew Ferguson (R-Ga), now chief deputy whip.
If Emmer wants to stay as campaigns chief, the job is seen as his to hold. Unless the GOP’s fortunes historically implode ahead of the midterms, though, House Republicans are expected to mount a second strong election showing under his leadership, which will no doubt bolster his street cred.
“I'm on the steering committee with him,” one House Republican member said, speaking on the condition of anonymity and referring to the group of senior members who dole out plum positions in the conference. “We're going to want to reward him, if there's something that he wants that he doesn’t have.”
That reward may or may not be the whip's job: Some Republicans mused that Emmer might not run if his ally McHenry seeks the role. Others are already starting to lay the groundwork to succeed Emmer at the NRCC, should he choose to leave a job that can bring as many pitfalls as it does benefits.
Emmer's handling of the NRCC helm helped burnish his reputation in the eyes of many Republicans. In interviews, members and aides praised his efforts to change the culture of the campaign arm, lift up its staff and do away with consultants to instead empower members to recruit “the best candidates.”
During his stewardship, the House GOP has worked to close the gap with Democrats’ ActBlue fundraising platform by boosting its own small-dollar online fundraising. The NRCC also has phased out one-size-fits-all ads in favor of more tailored hits at vulnerable Democrats.
Underpinning it all is Emmer's go-get-'em style, which colleagues likened to an energized hockey coach: He likes to win. Things didn't look like they were headed that way in 2020, with Trump floundering as a pandemic took hold and Democrats forecasting a blue wave. During the run-up to that election, Emmer dodged reporters trying to talk to him outside the House floor, telling colleagues he suspected a hit piece.
In the year-plus since the GOP picked up 15 seats while Trump lost, Emmer's fortunes have shifted dramatically.
Problems that once seemed cycle-defining are now a bit less daunting. Since Emmer warned the former presidentagainst backing primary challengers to the 10 House Republicans who supported impeachment, three of the 10 have decided against seeking reelection.
That doesn't mean the remaining seven, all of whom face primaries, won't prove challenging for an NRCC chief who has said the campaign arm won't get involved in intra-GOP contests.
He's previously said the party's internal push to oust Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and retiring Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), tapped by Democrats for the Jan. 6 select committee, was not helpful to the GOP's big-tent messaging. And when asked if Cheney would be able to use the NRCC as a resource, should she pay dues like its other members, Emmer didn’t dismiss the idea.
“That's a big if, because she's chosen a different path. That's totally up to her, how she handles it,” he replied.
The NRCC chairmanship is “the toughest job you could have, because you have to say no to a lot of people ... the only way you can survive it well is by being really honest,” said Rep. Kelly Armstrong (R-N.D.), who serves on the campaign committee with Emmer.
Asked to reflect on what he learned from 2020, Emmer said he wished the GOP had cast a wider net for winnable seats. Even so, the Republican conference brought in 18 women and a record number of minority GOP members during this Congress, an advancement that Emmer hopes to build on this fall.
“It looks like a repeat of last cycle. Our bench looks even more diverse,” said freshman Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.), who serves at the NRCC and is one of the two Black House Republicans to join the House last year.
Emmer, for his part, said that the NRCC tried to “make sure that our candidates looked and sounded more like the districts they were going to represent” when he first assumed the position.
“If there was an issue” in the past with the party's candidate slate, Emmer said, “it was that we didn't do a good job of recruiting those people that show that diversity to this national stage. ... It worked last time.”
Now that he's proven what can work for the NRCC, and with a potential midterm success set to vault him further up the party's ranks, Emmer is ever the prototypical team-building coach. He won't get involved in agenda questions, saying, “I leave that to Kevin, I leave that to Elise and Steve,” referring to McCarthy, Scalise and Stefanik.
And even behind closed doors, he's playing his cards so close that his allies don't know his next move.
“I think I'm pretty close with him. He has never mentioned it. And he's focused on one thing right now,” Armstrong said. “It's the truth. It's also politically smart.”
