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Wounded Warriors Exec and Corporate CEO Bob Nardelli Should Head Veterans Administration

March 31, 2018 By Editor 1 Comment

President Trump has announced his intention to replace Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin, with Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson.

The Department of Veterans Affairs has been scandal plagued for years, delivering poor quality services to this nation’s heroes since its inception, and especially since its elevation to a cabinet Department in 1988. Its nine VA Secretaries have each failed to bring order from chaos and corruption. Many observers are skeptical that physician Ronny Jackson has the managerial and leadership skills to fare any better than his predecessors.

Whether or not Ronny Jackson receives the requisite senate confirmation is yet to be seen. If so, the question still looms: can a military physician successfully tame a toxic bureaucracy that is the very embodiment of what the president vehemently terms ‘the swamp’?

Mr. President, to bring order and heartfelt camaraderie and efficacy to the VA we suggest that you take a very close look at longtime friend and advocate of our men and women in uniform, Bob Nardelli, who currently serves on the Wounded Warriors Project Board of Directors. The WWP Board of Directors is responsible for guiding the organization, and providing strategic and financial oversight, and Bob Nardelli has certainly fulfilled that mandate.

2014 – Wounded Warriors Project Board of Directors member Bob Nardelli, with Steven Nardizzi, Chief Executive Officer, and David Gowel, CEO, RockTech, at the Veterans Day Parade in New York City.

2015–Bob Nardelli is a frequent expert guest on many network financial and business news programs. Pictured with Stephen Howe Jr., and Maria Bartiromo, anchor and global markets editor at Fox News.

What will Bob Nardelli bring to the VA? Allow me to share a portion of what he has accomplished with his time, and moreover, his willingness to work hard to serve organizations and their members and beneficiaries.

The Home Depot. As the Chairman and CEO of The Home Depot he doubled its size and organized it into a well oiled machine–a machine with a heart, nonetheless, strengthening employees’ families and establishing strong ties to America’s military branches and veterans’ organizations. At the time Nardelli took the helm, The Home Depot was a $45 billion decentralized ‘family’ company with little ability to leverage its size. Bob moved quickly to create an information and supply-chain infrastructure that, along with other operational and growth enhancements, generated more than 20% average annual earnings growth over the next six years. Under his leadership, Home Depot‘s revenues grew from $45 billion to $91 billion, while net earnings more than doubled, from $2.5 billion to $5.7 billion. The company also added more than 1,000 new stores and more than 135,000 jobs, soon becoming the world’s second largest retailer.

Chrysler. Bob was named Chairman and CEO of struggling Chrysler, and recognized the early signs of the looming global financial crisis. He was the first Big Three CEO to predict significantly lower new car sales for 2008 and beyond. Bob and his team quickly reduced Chrysler’s footprint in advance of the downturn, while simultaneously repaying a billion dollars of its debt, and accelerating new product development while introducing a range of fuel-efficient an award-winning vehicles. They also laid the groundwork for a partnership with Fiat. Industry analysts and Fiat itself would later say that these bold move saved Chrysler from extinction and allowed it to emerge from its restructuring in under two months, with a new product line intact and a distribution network that would make it a truly global player in the automotive industry.

US President George W. Bush (L) speaks about the economy as Home Depot President and CEO Bob Nardelli (R) looks on inside the Home Depot in Halethorpe, Maryland, December 5, 2003. AFP PHOTO/PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/Getty Images)

As a civic-minded executive, Nardelli has chaired the Atlanta Board of Visitors of the Savannah College of Art and Design, and served on President Bush’s Council on Service and Civic Participation. He has also served on advisory boards at the University of Louisville and Western Illinois University. In addition to managing XLR-8, Bob Nardelli is Senior Advisor to the chief executive officer of Cerberus Capital Management LP, and Senior Advisor to Ernst & Young, the international accounting and consulting firm.

Bob Nardelli has everything the VA needs in a leader. We are very hopeful that Mr. Trump will seriously consider him as the man to restore the faith of our nation’s heroes, and to help a grateful nation honor them as we so strongly desire.

By James Thompson. James Thompson is a political analyst and writer, and ghostwriter of the nation’s top business and political leaders.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Religion, Sci-Tech

FBI Agent Charged with Leaking Classified Docs to Expose ‘Systemic Biases’

March 29, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

A former FBI agent in Minneapolis, seeking to expose what his attorneys called “systemic biases” at the agency, was charged this week with illegally disseminating classified information, according to a report.

Terry J. Albury, who joined the FBI in 2000, allegedly sent two classified documents to a reporter at an unspecified national media organization, according to charging documents obtained by the Star Tribune of Minneapolis.

Albury’s prosecution comes months after Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Trump administration promised to cut down on leaks in the federal government.

The former agent was charged with two counts of unauthorized disclosure of national defense information. Prosecutors filed a felony information, which signals that Albury is expected to plead guilty.

One of the leaked documents reportedly pertains to the agency’s methods for assessing confidential informants, while the other relates to “threats posed by certain individuals from a particular Middle Eastern country,” according to the information.

FILE PHOTO: FBI Director Christopher Wray delivers remarks to a graduation ceremony at the FBI Academy on the grounds of Marine Corps Base Quantico in Quantico, Virginia, U.S. December 15, 2017.  REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

FBI Director Christopher Wray was recently criticized by Attorney General Jeff Sessions for the agency’s ‘unacceptable’ pace.  (Reuters)

Albury shared the documents sometime between February 2016 and Jan. 31, 2017, prosecutors allege. He had most recently been assigned to counterterrorism operations at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport.

Albury’s attorneys, JaneAnne Murray and Joshua Dratel, said in a statement that Albury served the U.S. with distinction domestically and in Iraq and “accepts full responsibility for the conduct set forth in the Information.

“We would like to add that as the only African-American FBI field agent in Minnesota, Mr. Albury’s actions were driven by a conscientious commitment to long-term national security and addressing the well-documented systemic biases within the FBI,” the attorneys added.

Prosecutors don’t name a reporter or news organization, but on Jan. 31 of last year, the Intercept posted a story about how the FBI assesses and manages informants.

“The use of the Espionage Act to prosecute whistleblowers seeking to shed light on matters of vital public concern is an outrage.”

– The Intercept editor-in-chief Betsy Reed

The story references a secret document dated Aug. 17, 2011, that deals with assessing informants and recruiting them by identifying their “motivations and vulnerabilities.”

In a statement, the Intercept editor-in-chief Betsy Reed sharply criticized whistleblower prosecutions without specifically discussing Albury’s alleged involvement.

“We do not discuss anonymous sources,” Reed said. “The use of the Espionage Act to prosecute whistleblowers seeking to shed light on matters of vital public concern is an outrage, and all journalists have the right under the First Amendment to report these stories.”

The Trump administration has made prosecuting government employees who leak sensitive information to the media a high priority.

The investigation will determine if anyone in the ranks broke the rules when convincing federal judges to sign off on surveillance during the Russian collusion probe. Video

Inspector general opens probe of alleged bias in FBI, DOJ

Last year, Sessions pledged to clamp down on leaks, noting that the Justice Department had more than tripled the number of active leak investigations since President Barack Obama left office and that the FBI had created a new counterintelligence unit to focus on such cases.

He told members of Congress in November that the department was conducting 27 investigations into leaks of classified information.

The local FBI office referred questions to the Justice Department, which is handling the case. A spokesman with the Justice Department declined to comment beyond the charging documents.

The search warrant applications say the FBI linked references to secret documents in data requests filed by the Intercept to Albury’s activity on the bureau’s information systems.

The FBI also later identified 27 documents — 16 marked classified — that the Intercept published, and found that Albury had accessed more than two-thirds of them.

The charges filed Tuesday also allege that from April 7, 2017, to Aug. 28, 2017, Albury willfully kept a document about an online platform used by a specific terrorist group for recruitment, and failed to give it to an officer and federal employee who was entitled to it.

FoxNews.com / The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Sci-Tech

Former FBI Agent Says Andrew McCabe ‘Targeted’ and ‘Slandered’ Her

March 26, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

A former FBI counterterrorism agent reacted to an op-ed written by recently-fired FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.

“Not in my worst nightmares did I dream my FBI career would end this way,” McCabe entitled his Washington Post piece published Friday.

Robyn Gritz, who said she served 16 years with the bureau fighting terrorism, told “Fox & Friends” that she celebrated McCabe’s dismissal and that it brought back memories of how he allegedly mistreated her.

Gritz said that she began working with McCabe in 2005 until she ultimately resigned several years later.

She said McCabe retaliated against her for filing a harassment claim against one of her supervisors.

Gritz said that, while working as a “detailee” to the CIA, her boss began “scrutinizing [her] work and asking questions” about her purportedly being “fragile” after her divorce.

“He made some discriminatory comments about why I was traveling and such,” Gritz said of her boss at the time, who was not McCabe.

When she heard that the boss was making similar comments to a black coworker, Gritz said she decided to file a complaint against him.

Gritz said when she filed the suit, McCabe signed off on an internal investigation against her, adding that “he know that I was either filing or going to file the [case].”

“I went through hell for a year and a half,” she said. “Andy made sure I couldn’t get out of the division.”

Gritz said that McCabe additionally made “nasty, false” comments about her in a meeting — “lying,” she said. “which is why he just got fired.”

She said she was at a restaurant when news of McCabe’s dismissal this month reached her, and that she verbally reacted with joy.

Gritz added that dozens of former FBI coworkers called her to celebrate McCabe “being held accountable.”

FoxNews.com

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“March For Our Lives’ Offers No Solutions

March 25, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

Following last month’s shooting spree at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School liberals have taken to the streets to boisterously push their pet political agenda–to decimate the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution; the right of U.S. citizens to keep and bear arms. To further their political ambitions they have used (abused) the indoctrinated students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School–whom they term “survivors.”

Indeed, many of the children who attended Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School are shouting out leftist anti-constitution talking points through megaphones supplied by a variety of leftist organizations, most of which are financially supported by notorious international leftist financier George Soros, whose unmistakably anti-American activities seek to undermine the U.S. Constitution on multiple fronts.

Exploiting the trauma of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students are many leftist celebrities and politicians, all drawn to the “spontaneous” movement like sharks to blood, seeking to push their anti-constitution agenda onto a gullible public.

The problem with all of the shouting is that not one practical idea is being offered to stop would-be school shooters.

Background checks? Already have them. Outlaw automatic weapons? Did it decades ago. End gun violence? Sure–great idea, but how?

It is obvious that the anti-gun lobbyists are behind the current March For Our Lives movement. What do they want? A disarmed citizenry. When do they want it? NOW!

Before leftists have taken over every democracy or other society, they have first had to disarm its citizens–it’s difficult to dictate to people who have the power to resist your edicts. That is what is going on here. Pure and simple. You can dress it up in all sorts of costumes, and you can even put lipstick on it–but that changes nothing. The entire idea of disarming U.S. citizens has nothing to do with safety or non-violence. It is a leftist political expansion expediency, period.

Perhaps the only usable suggestion arising out of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School massacre is to coordinate mental health issue reporting systems. Of course, that’s not the goal of the March For Our Lives movement. What has been exposed in this arena is the government’s total lack of ability to protect the public from monsters who decide to inscribe their names in eternal infamy. The “government” had several opportunities to prevent Nikolas Cruz from getting a weapon, and to institutionalize him for obvious mental disorders–but in typical government fashion, it failed at every step. Yet, this is the same government that the left promises us will protect us when we are no longer armed and able to protect ourselves.

No thank you.

By James Thompson

 

 

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Religion, Sci-Tech

Trump Signs $1.3 Trillion Spending Bill

March 23, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

President Trump signed the $1.3 trillion omnibus spending bill Friday despite an earlier threat to veto the legislation due to the lack of border wall funding and a fix for DACA.

Trump signed the mammoth legislation reluctantly, saying in a press availability with other members of the administration that, in order to secure a necessary increase in military spending, he had to give money to Democratic projects that he derided as a “wasted sum of money.”

“It’s not right and it’s very bad for our country,” he said.

But he said that military spending was very important, and that for that reason he had decided to sign the bill.

“Therefore, as a matter of national security, I’ve signed this omnibus budget bill. There are a lot of things I’m unhappy about in this bill…But I say to Congress, I will never sign another bill like this again. I’m not going to do it again,” he said.

Trump had tweeted earlier Friday that he was considering using the veto, saying that recipients of the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program “have been totally abandoned by the Democrats.” He added that the border wall, which he said was “desperately needed for our National Defense” is not fully funded.

The House adjourned Friday morning until Monday, meaning that if Trump had vetoed the bill then the government would shut down.

Trump moved to end the DACA program in September, giving Congress a six-month window to come up with a legislative fix. That deadline has been delayed by court orders, but the fate of the 800,000 enrolled recipients is still uncertain.

The White House has tried to use the DACA issue to convince Democrats to support approximately $25 billion in funding for Trump’s central campaign promise. But a congressional GOP source told Fox News talks broke drown after Democrats pushed for a path to citizenship to include also those who are currently eligible — expanding those covered to 1.8 million.

Congress' new spending bill includes provisions on everything from gun violence to immigration, here are five facts you should know. Video

The spending bill passed Congress includes only $1.6 billion for border measures — much of which is for repairs to already existing fencing. It explicitly rules out any new prototypes of the kind President Trump viewed this month in California. But House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and the White House has pushed back against conservative concerns on Thursday, saying it provided for 100 miles of border construction.

Democrats had claimed victory on the issue, pointing to the fact that Trump’s requests for new deportation agents and detention center beds had gone unanswered, although they had expressed disappointment at the failure to get a DACA fix in the bill.

The deal has also irked more conservative members of Congress, who objected to the size and cost of the bill (which ran in at over 2,000 pages) as well as the failure to remove funding for Planned Parenthood and so-called “sanctuary cities.”  Other Republicans approved of the deal, pointing to a massive increase in military and infrastructure spending as well as funding to help combat the nation’s opioid crisis.

Trump’s veto threat was totally unexpected, particularly as the White House had signaled Trump would support the bill if passed by Congress. Most lawmakers have already left Washington for a two week recess. Some are on overseas trips already.

Some conservatives applauded Trump’s calls for a veto. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., called the bill “totally irresponsible” and encouraged the veto: “I am just down the street and will bring you a pen,” he tweeted.

Budget hawk Rand Paul, R-Ky., tweeted that Trump should veto “this sad excuse for legislation.”

The conservative House Freedom Caucus, which had opposed the measure, also expressed their support should the president choose to wield his veto pen.

But Fox News learned that Defense Secretary James Mattis was calling Trump about the possibility of losing all defense increases if he vetoes it.

It appeared to be this argument about the military that ultimately convinced Trump to sign the legislation.

“My highest duty is to keep America safe,” he said.

__________

Fox News’ Chad Pergram and Mike Emanuel contributed to this report.

Adam Shaw is a Politics Reporter and occasional Opinion writer for FoxNews.com. He can be reached here or on Twitter: @AdamShawNY.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Religion, Sci-Tech

John Bolton to Replace H.R. McMaster as White House National Security Adviser

March 22, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

President Trump announced Thursday that former United Nations Amb. John Bolton will replace Gen. H.R. McMaster as his National Security Adviser effective April 9.

“I am pleased to announce that, effective 4/9/18, @AmbJohnBolton will be my new National Security Advisor. I am very thankful for the service of General H.R. McMaster who has done an outstanding job & will always remain my friend. There will be an official contact handover on 4/9,” Trump tweeted.

The president’s announcement came after months of speculation over whether McMaster would resign or be fired from his post.

Bolton told Fox News’ “The Story” Thursday evening, “I didn’t really expect that announcement this afternoon, but it’s obviously a great honor. It’s always an honor to serve our country and I think particularly in these times internationally, it’s a particular honor.”

But on Thursday evening, a White House official said that the president and McMaster “mutually agreed” that he would resign from his post. The two have been discussing this for some time, the official said, noting that the timeline was expedited as they both felt it was important to have a new team in place, instead of constant speculation.

National security correspondent Jennifer Griffin and chief intelligence correspondent Catherine Herridge on President Trump tapping the Fox News contributor and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations to replace H.R. McMaster as national security adviser.

A White House official said the decision was not related to any one moment or incident, but rather the result of ongoing conversations between the two.

The official told Fox News that the move has been contemplated for some time, and was just about the “worst-kept secret” in Washington.

The president took his time to find a replacement for McMaster because he wanted the “right person.”

While Trump spoke to Bolton many times about the job, the deal was cemented in an Oval Office meeting between the two Thursday afternoon.

Bolton told Fox News’ Martha MacCallum that the process of his hiring “came to a conclusion this afternoon, but … there’s still a transition. I look forward to working with H.R. and his team and the other senior members of the president’s team on national security and I have no doubt there’s a lot of work to do.”

Bolton has served as a Fox News contributor. The position of White House national security adviser does not require Senate confirmation.

“After thirty-four years of service to our nation, I am requesting retirement from the U.S. Army effective this summer after which I will leave public service. Throughout my career it has been my greatest privilege top serve alongside extraordinary servicemembers and dedicated civilians,” McMaster said in a statement.

He added: “I am thankful to President Donald J. Trump for the opportunity to serve him and our nation as national security adviser. I am grateful for the friendship and support of the members of the National Security Council who worked together to provide the President with the best options to protect and advance our national interests.”

McMaster said he was “especially proud” to have served with National Security Council staff, who he said “established a strong foundation for protecting the American people, promoting American prosperity, achieving peace through strength, and advancing American influence.

“I know that these patriots will continue to serve our President and our nation with distinction,” McMaster said.

White House chief of staff John Kelly said McMaster is “a fine American and Military officer.”

“He has served with distinction and honor throughout his career in the U.S. Army and as the National Security Advisor,” Kelly said Thursday. “He brought and maintained discipline and energy to our vital interagency processes. He helped develop options for the president and ensured that those options were presented fully and fairly. A true solider-scholar, his impact on his country and this government will be felt for years to come.”

Bolton, who served as U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations from 2005 to 2006 and as Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security from 2001 to 2005, will take over for McMaster next month.

“Thank you to Lieutenant General HR McMaster for your service and loyalty to our country. Your selfless courage and leadership has inspired all of us. Most of all, thank you for your friendship,” current U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley tweeted.

A White House official said Bolton is one of the strongest voices and experts on the full range of national security issues and challenges facing the U.S.

McMaster’s retirement comes just one week after the president fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Twitter, and after other high profile administration departures. Earlier this month, Chief Economic Adviser Gary Cohn resigned amid disagreements over a round of steel and aluminum tariffs, which Trump supported.

Bolton has served in the Republican administrations of Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, and served as a Bush lawyer during the 2000 Florida recount.

A strong supporter of the Iraq war and an advocate for aggressive use of American power in foreign policy, Bolton was unable to win Senate confirmation after his nomination to the U.N. post alienated many Democrats and even some Republicans. He resigned after serving 17 months as a Bush “recess appointment,” which allowed him to hold the job on a temporary basis without Senate confirmation.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., tweeted that Bolton “was too extreme to be confirmed as UN ambassador in 2005 and is absolutely the wrong person to be national security advisor [sic] now.”

McMaster was brought in after Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, was dismissed after less than a month in office. White House officials said he was ousted because he did not tell top advisers, including Vice President Mike Pence, about the full extent of his contacts with Russian officials.

Fox News’ Kristin Brown, Chad Pergram, John Roberts, Samuel Chamberlain and The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

Brooke Singman is a Politics Reporter for Fox News. Follow her on Twitter at @brookefoxnews.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Religion, Sci-Tech

Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe Fired 2 Days Before Retirement

March 16, 2018 By Editor 1 Comment

The Justice Department dealt a stunning blow to former Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe on Friday night, firing him just days before he would have been eligible for a lifetime pension after determining that he lied to investigators reviewing the bureau’s probe of Hillary Clinton’s email server.

“Pursuant to Department Order 1202, and based on the report of the Inspector General, the findings of the FBI Office of Professional Responsibility, and the recommendation of the Department’s senior career official, I have terminated the employment of Andrew McCabe effective immediately,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement.

“After an extensive and fair investigation and according to Department of Justice procedure, the Department’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) provided its report on allegations of misconduct by Andrew McCabe to the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR),” Sessions said.

“The FBI’s OPR then reviewed the report and underlying documents and issued a disciplinary proposal recommending the dismissal of Mr. McCabe.  Both the OIG and FBI OPR reports concluded that Mr. McCabe had made an unauthorized disclosure to the news media and lacked candor − including under oath − on multiple occasions.

“The FBI expects every employee to adhere to the highest standards of honesty, integrity, and accountability. As the OPR proposal stated, ‘all FBI employees know that lacking candor under oath results in dismissal and that our integrity is our brand.'”

McCabe hit back in a fiery response of his own.

“This attack on my credibility is one part of a larger effort not just to slander me personally, but to taint the FBI, law enforcement, and intelligence professionals more generally,” McCabe said. “It is part of this Administration’s ongoing war on the FBI and the efforts of the Special Counsel investigation, which continue to this day. Their persistence in this campaign only highlights the importance of the Special Counsel’s work.

“For the last year and a half, my family and I have been the targets of an unrelenting assault on our reputation and my service to this country,” McCabe continued. “Articles too numerous to count have leveled every sort of false, defamatory and degrading allegation against us. The President’s tweets have amplified and exacerbated it all. He called for my firing. He called for me to be stripped of my pension after more than 20 years of service. And all along we have said nothing, never wanting to distract from the mission of the FBI by addressing the lies told and repeated about us. No more.”

McCabe’s firing marked a stunning fall for a man who was No. 2 at the bureau for a time under former FBI Director James Comey, ran it and even was reportedly on President Donald Trump’s short list for the directorship.

But McCabe has also been mired in controversy in recent years.

Sessions’ decision to fire McCabe came as Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz concluded a bureau oversight investigation, with a report expected to be critical of McCabe’s handling of the Clinton email probe, his handling of the bureau during the early months of the Russia investigation, and his ties to the Democratic Party.

Horowitz determined that McCabe hadn’t been forthcoming in regard to the handling of the FBI’s probe into Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state in the Obama administration.

The inspector general’s finding sparked an FBI disciplinary process that recommended McCabe’s firing.

Sources told Fox News that the FBI’s Office of Professional Responsibility made the recommendation to fire McCabe. Sessions had the option to either accept the recommendation, or step in to stop the firing process.

Horowitz’s investigation, which landed McCabe in hot water, faults the former deputy director for the way he answered questions about his approval for interactions between an FBI official and a reporter about the bureau’s investigation into the nonprofit Clinton Foundation.

McCabe was “removed” from his post as deputy to FBI Director Christopher Wray in January, setting in motion a plan to leave the bureau after months of conflict-of-interest complaints from Republicans — including President Trump.

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Thursday that the decision was entirely up to Sessions, but that McCabe was a “bad actor.”

“That’s a determination we [left] up to Attorney General Sessions, but we do think that it is well documented that he has had some very troubling behavior and has been a bad actor,” Sanders said.

“FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe is racing the clock to retire with full benefits. 90 days to go?!!!” Trump tweeted in December, before McCabe’s removal.

McCabe became acting director of the FBI after Trump fired Comey on May 9, 2017. McCabe led the bureau, independently, until Aug. 2, 2017 — during the early months of the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election and potential collusion with Trump campaign associates.

Republicans have also long criticized McCabe for his ties to the Democratic Party — his wife received donations during a failed 2015 Virginia Senate run from a group tied to a Clinton ally, former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe — all while the Clinton email probe was underway.

“How can FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, the man in charge, along with leakin’ James Comey, of the Phony Hillary Clinton investigation (including her 33,000 illegally deleted emails) be given $700,000 for wife’s campaign by Clinton Puppets during investigation?” the president tweeted in December.

The president was “not a part of the decisionmaking process,” when McCabe was removed from the bureau in January, press secretary Sanders said.

McCabe returned to the white-hot spotlight when Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee released its memo on Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) abuses in connection with the Russia probe, saying that McCabe signed a FISA warrant targeting former Trump campaign volunteer adviser Carter Page.

“McCabe testified before the committee in December 2017 that no surveillance warrant would have been sought from the [FISA court] without the Steele dossier information,” the memo read. The Steele dossier was unverified, and financed as opposition research by the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign.

And recently uncovered text messages between FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page revealed a new timeline in the Clinton email probe, apparently showing McCabe’s knowledge of the investigation.

The text messages suggest that as of Sept. 28, 2016, Strzok, Page and McCabe were aware of new Clinton emails found on the laptop of disgraced former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner, spouse of Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin.

“Got called up to Andy’s earlier … hundreds of thousands of emails turned over by Weiner’s atty to sdny, includes a ton of material from spouse. Sending team up tomorrow to review…this will never end …” Strzok wrote in a text message to Page.

But it wasn’t until Oct. 27, 2016 that Comey was briefed on the newly discovered emails — meaning McCabe kept the director in the dark for a month.

Horowitz is specifically investigating McCabe and whether he wanted to avoid taking action on the laptop findings until after the presidential election, in which Clinton lost to Trump.

According to testimony obtained by Fox News from an Office of Special Counsel interview with former Comey Chief of Staff James Rybicki, McCabe’s office did not notify him until the night of Oct. 26, 2016.

The OSC also interviewed FBI Deputy General Counsel Trisha Anderson, who testified that Comey was first briefed on the material found on Weiner’s laptop on Oct. 27, 2016.

Anderson noted that the director’s office decided to “urgently” address the situation.

“Given the significance of the matter, um, uh, that we had to proceed quickly,” Anderson told investigators. “It was just too, too explosive for us to sit on.”

So it wasn’t until Oct. 28, 2016, that Comey sent a letter to Congress announcing the “recent developments” of the discovery of the Clinton and Abedin communications found on the laptop —which he had just been briefed on a day before. That letter reopened the Clinton email probe just a week before the election. The inspector general is investigating McCabe’s involvement in this timeline.

Several Republicans also have pointed with alarm to the Strzok-Page texts and their references to McCabe in relation to an “insurance policy” to prevent Trump from being elected president, and a “secret society” within the bureau.

Brooke Singman is a Politics Reporter for Fox News. Follow her on Twitter at @brookefoxnews.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Sci-Tech

Warren: No White House bid, No DNA test

March 11, 2018 By Editor 2 Comments

Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Sunday ruled out a 2020 presidential run and taking a DNA test to prove Native American ancestry — an issue that has nagged her Senate campaigns and would almost certainly create problems in a White House bid.

“I’m not running for president,” Warren, a champion of the Democratic Party’s progressive wing, told “Fox News Sunday.”

When asked Sunday whether she’d agree to calls for genetic testing to resolve the heritage controversy, Warren launched into a family history, as purportedly told by her parents and grandparents, before saying, “It’s a part of who I am, and no one’s ever going to take that away.”

Warren, who is seeking a second Senate term this year, has been accused of saying she is of Native American heritage to help in securing jobs, including one as a Harvard law professor.

She has acknowledged identifying as a minority, but denies using such status to help advance her career.

President Trump has repeatedly called Warren, a Wall Street critic and potential White House rival, “Pocahontas,” a notable American Indian woman in colonial history, to highlight the controversy.

“Let me tell you a little bit about my family,” Warren said Sunday. “My mom and dad were born and raised out in Oklahoma, and my daddy was in his teens when he fell in love with my mother.

“She was a beautiful girl who played the piano. And he was head over heels in love with her and wanted to marry her. And his family was bitterly opposed to that because she was part Native American.

“And eventually my parents eloped and they survived the Great Depression, they survived The Dust Bowl. They went through a lot of hard times. They raised three boys, my older brothers, all of whom went off to the military.

“They raised me. They knocked around and it was tough but they hung together. They hung together for 63 years. I know who I am because of what my mother and my father told me, what my grandmother and my grandfather told me, what all my aunts and uncles told me and my brothers.”

Joseph Weber

By Joseph Weber | Fox News

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North Korea: Trump-Kim Meeting Proves President’s Strategy Worked

March 9, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

President Trump’s upcoming meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un – announced Thursday night to a shocked world – is a stunning vindication of the president’s strategy and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster’s artful behind-the-scenes acumen.

North Korea’s invitation for the meeting and President Trump’s acceptance marked a historic step. If a genuine rapprochement occurs on President Trump’s watch, leading to denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, the impact on global security and President Trump’s legacy will be enormous.

But at this point, it’s important for President Trump and his foreign policy and defense team to proceed with extreme caution. While they deserve credit for cracking the North Korean silence, the historical record suggests this could be a trap, if not an intentional distraction.

President Trump’s engaged, creative and blunt approach – with artful backroom diplomacy – has turned the dial. If this strategic opening leads somewhere, the Russia investigation of the 2016 election will become a footnote on world-changing achievement. President Trump will instead be remembered for calling out North Korea’s intolerable nuclear and intercontinental ballistic missile threats to global civilization.

But a decision to meet, even a North Korean promise to denuclearize, is not an agreement, implementation, verification or a factually denuclearized Peninsula. And the odds of success remain long.

When the North Koreans need time, they promise talk. Is talk worth having? Sure – as long as everyone understands, talk is not a substitute for action.

On the plus side, President Trump not only triggered this opening, but persuaded China to make sanctions real, which occasions a nod to both the president and China.

On the minus side, the record suggests profound skepticism is warranted about North Korea’s intentions.

In 1985, pressured hard by Ronald Reagan, North Korea – led by the current leader’s grandfather – signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation treaty (NPT). Everyone was happy. The world celebrated.

That triggered a running of the clock on an 18-month signing of the “safeguards agreement,” implementing the NPT. The North Koreans ignored the clock. Suddenly, they demanded South Korea drop nuclear weapons.

Six years on, President George H.W. Bush withdrew all American nuclear weapons from overseas – including from South Korea – in order to induce the Soviets to do the same. At that time, North Korea finally signed the safeguards agreement.

Reversal was again fast. That year, North Korea was caught and sanctioned for missile proliferation and cheating on the NPT with a rogue plutonium reprocessing plant.

By early 1993, the North Koreans had firmly refused International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspections. But later that year, they doubled back. They allowed them in theory, if the West would pledge not ever to attack, which of course we did.

But in 1994, North Korea was caught red-handed again, this time producing enough plutonium for “one or two nuclear weapons.” Funny thing, the North had done all this cheating while allowing IAEA inspections to other locations.

When caught by the IAEA with the plutonium reprocessing plant, North Korea summarily quit the NPT. So much for a solid kick between the goalposts, long run, but no cigar.

Like Charlie Brown to the rescue, idealist on call, former President Jimmy Carter flew over to North Korea, and magically announced he had negotiated a “freeze” on North Korea’s nuclear program. The world again celebrated.

For better or worse, North Korea’s President, Kim II Sung died that year, succeeded by his son Kim Jong II, who was later be succeeded by his son, current leader Kim Jong Un.

Kim Jong II toyed with agreements halting nuclear weapons and missile development, but suddenly demanded “compensation” from the U.S. for giving them up. President Clinton gave nothing to North Korea. A smart move.

Soon enough, more cheating produced American sanctions. Without Chinese support, they failed. Over the next 20 years, the North Korean nuclear weapons and missile programs continued their unmitigated, undeterred and largely ignored advance.

Missile launches and underground nuclear tests proliferated, beside useless negotiations. More sanctions came, but U.S. intelligence concluded by 2000 that North Korea was developing missiles that would soon be able to hit American territories in the Pacific.

Promises were ritually made anew, boldly flouted, with new sanctions imposed, and nothing changed. After seven rounds of negotiations, and a steady flow of wishful diplomats and wistful proclamations, nothing led to nothing, as nothing ever does.

When the North Koreans need time, they promise talk. Is talk worth having?  Sure – as long as everyone understands, talk is not a substitute for action.

Today things are definitely different. America’s economic and military might are locked, loaded and ready. Current sanctions are real, robust and bound to bite. China is finally helping, and America’s credibility has been boldly restored. But this is not enough, unless North Korea is serious.

Frankly, the stakes are higher than most imagine, a fork in the road, resolution or submission to nuclear blackmail. We are at a Rubicon, a moment of choosing for us, but more so for North Korea’s leadership.

For good to come of this, we must see a mutual intent to end the madness. The question at this moment, with true and new hope in our sails, is this: Does North Korea appreciate the enormity of this moment, which could be existential? Is the regime serious about this negotiation?

President Trump set out to stop the historic merry-go-round. And it looks like, for the moment, he has done it.

The North Korean invitation and President Trump’s acceptance are monumental steps, but the unspoken question remains – toward what?

Can they get to genuine denuclearization and a rollback of North Korea’s decades-old ambition and threat? Or are we about to be disappointed again? If that happens, the risk to North Korea goes sky high, but does the Kim government know that?

As hope is not a strategy, talk cannot be an endgame. What happens next is critical, but is infused with new hope. Suddenly, there exists a previously unknown, world-changing breakthrough.

Such things do happen.

If this produces a lasting peace and a denuclearized North Korea, President Trump will rise in global stature like no president since Ronald Reagan. But history suggests caution. Courage and hard work may produce the good outcome, or may not. We can dare to hope, we should dare, as the president has, but with realism.

Robert Charles is a former assistant secretary of state for President George W. Bush, former naval intelligence officer and litigator. He served in the Reagan and Bush 41 White Houses.

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Big Dems Run From Mega-Donor When Gay Lover Found Dead

February 28, 2018 By Editor 1 Comment

Some Dems disavow mega-donor amid probe of male escort Gemmel Moore’s death

Democratic donor Ed Buck is seen with Hillary Clinton in 2016. Gemmel Moore, who died inside Buck’s home, is seen at right. (Facebook)

At least a half dozen Democrats have quietly returned or redirected donations from a high-powered donor being investigated in the fatal drug overdose of a male escort—while bigger-name national party figures who also took his money remain uncharacteristically silent on the case.

The mayor of Los Angeles, three members of Congress, two people running for Congress and the Los Angeles district attorney have all returned or given away their donations from Ed Buck, 63, a West Hollywood resident who has given more than $500,000 to Democratic candidates and groups over the years. Buck is now the subject of an investigation into the death of Gemmel Moore, a 26-year-old escort who was found dead of a methamphetamine overdose at Buck’s home on July 27.

Buck’s own congressman, Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, who received $2,700 in 2016, told Fox News through a spokesperson that he donated the full amount to the Trevor Project—a nonprofit that provides crisis intervention and suicide prevention services to LGBTQ youth nationwide.

Schiff’s press office would not confirm precisely when he made the donation to the Trevor Project. “The death of Gemmel Moore is deeply tragic,” Emilie Simons, spokesperson for Schiff, told Fox News in a recent statement.

But Hillary Clinton and former president Barack Obama, both of whom also received donations from Buck, have not responded to inquiries about the case.

U.S. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence ranking member Representative Adam Schiff (D-CA) speaks with reporters about the Committee's Russia investigation on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., March 30, 2017. REUTERS/Yuri Gripas - RC19665E3000

Congressman Adam Schiff of California donated the $2,700 he received from Ed Buck to the Trevor Project. (Reuters)

The investigation into Moore’s death, originally ruled an accidental overdose, was reopened in August by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office. Boosted by information found at the scene and provided by Moore’s family, the case remains open as officials try to find and interview others who may have been involved with Buck in similar situations, or have some knowledge of the case.

JUSTICE FOR GEMMEL MOORE? FAMILY WANTS ANSWERS IN ESCORT’S DEATH AT DEM DONOR’S HOME

Among the allegations being investigated are reports that Buck frequently employed escorts to come to his home and do drugs. Authorities have examined a diary found in Moore’s possessions, which appears to describe Buck’s apparent insistence and instruction that Moore do drugs.

Buck’s attorney, Seymour Amster, maintains that his client bears no responsibility for Moore’s death and told Fox News that Buck was “legitimately trying to help” the young man.

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti speaks at the 2018 California Democrats State Convention Saturday, Feb. 24, 2018, in San Diego. (AP Photo/Denis Poroy)

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti returned Ed Buck’s donation in November of last year. (AP)

“The cause of [Moore’s] death was not the result of anything Mr. Buck did,” Amster told Fox News, adding that his client considered Moore a friend.

The reopened investigation was enough for Kevin de Leon, a California state senator who is hoping to unseat Sen. Dianne Feinstein, to give $19,700 in contributions from Buck—made over the course of several years—to a local nonprofit.

“Senator de Leon has absolutely zero tolerance for hate, discrimination or violence of any kind. He has donated Mr. Buck’s contribution to a provider of crisis prevention services for survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault,” Jonathan Underland, a spokesperson for the state senator, said after Fox News published an article on the case on Feb. 13.

Other officials had similarly distanced themselves from Buck.

“What I am hearing and reading about [Buck’s] conduct with Gemmel is deeply disturbing.”

– Rep. Karen Bass of California

An adviser for Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti told Fox News on Tuesday his office last year returned $1,400 from Buck that was contributed in November of 2016. The money was returned soon after the case was reopened, the adviser said.

Los Angeles District Attorney Jackie Lacey, who received $100 from Buck in 2012, returned that donation in the last month.

“DA Lacey does not know Mr. Buck and she has returned the contribution,” Lacey’s campaign consultant told Fox News.

A campaign spokesperson for Rep. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona told Fox News this week that the congresswoman donated the $5,400 she’d received from Buck to a Phoenix organization for homeless youth.

kevin de leon

California State Sen. Kevin de Leon gave the funds from Buck to a local nonprofit. (California State Senate)

“It’s horribly sad that this young man lost his life. We wish his family peace. While the investigation continues, we’ve donated the money to the Tumbleweed program at UMOM New Day Center,” the campaign said in a statement to Fox News.

And the first elected official to disavow Buck’s contribution, California Rep. Karen Bass, gave her $250 donation to Moore’s family back in August.

“I’m stunned by the news of Gemmel’s death and the tragic and sad circumstances surrounding it,” Bass said in a statement. “What I am hearing and reading about [Buck’s] conduct with Gemmel is deeply disturbing.

If there are other victims, they should come forward immediately,” Bass said in a statement. “It is my hope that law enforcement is prepared to investigate and prosecute to the fullest extent of the law.”

Bryan Caforio, who is running to represent the 25th Congressional district seat currently occupied by Republican Rep. Steve Knight, last year returned a $2,700 contribution that he received from Buck in October of 2016.

gemmel moore facebook

Family and friends of Moore, above, have demanded that Democrats return funds they received from Buck. (Facebook)

Moore’s family and friends have launched a campaign to bring awareness to the case, and have asked all Democrats who received contributions from Buck to either return the funds or donate them to Moore’s family or a nonprofit.

A petition circulating calling for the action has picked up 4,584 signatures. “As Democrats we are often the first to call on Republicans to return money at the slightest hint of impropriety — there should not be a double standard when a Democratic donor is involved in the wrongdoing,” the petition states.

But not every politician has repudiated Buck. West Hollywood Mayor John Heilman, who received a $500 donation in March, told Fox News he has “no intention” of returning the donation, adding: “I support a full and fair investigation by the Sheriff’s department with respect to the tragic death of Gemmel Moore.”

When Fox News asked Amster about Buck’s donations being returned, and whether his client plans to continue giving money to the Democratic Party, he said: “It’s their decision and what he’s doing politically is his private business.”

Christopher Carbone is a reporter for FoxNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @christocarbone.

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Broward Coward – Deputy Who Hid During School Shooting Seeks Armed Guards

February 23, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

Cop who didn’t enter school during Florida shooting resigns, has home guarded, is slammed as ‘coward’ by Trump

The home of the former school resource deputy who stayed outside the Florida high school as last week’s massacre unfolded was being protected Friday by law enforcement officials — even as President Trump called out the ex-cop, suggesting he was a “coward.”

Deputy Scot Peterson, shown speaking in 2015, was armed and stationed on campus when Nikolas Cruz opened fire.

Reporters who attempted to approach the West Palm Beach home of ex-Broward County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Scot Peterson were reportedly met with resistance from at least six police officers who were standing guard outside.

“They prevented us from approaching the house,” WSVN’s Frank Guzman tweeted Thursday.

An Associated Press reporter said he approached Peterson’s home Thursday night, seeing lights on inside and cars present. He rang the doorbell twice, but no one answered.

TIMELINE OF FLORIDA SCHOOL SHOOTING

Before departing for his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday morning, Trump, in a set of fiery remarks, lambasted Peterson.

“When it came time to get in there and do something, he didn’t have the courage, or something happened,” Trump said. “He certainly did a poor job. That’s the case where somebody was outside, they are trained, they didn’t react properly under pressure or they were a coward.”

Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel said Peterson, who was armed when gunman Nikolas Cruz opened fire at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, “never went in[to]” the building that was under attack. He said the school resource officer instead took up a position viewing the western entrance of the building.

Students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School attend a memorial following a school shooting incident in Parkland, Florida, U.S., February 15, 2018. REUTERS/Thom Baur - RC1AFD9727E0

Officials said Thursday the resource deputy assigned to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, never entered the building during Feb. 14’s mass shooting.  (Reuters)

Israel said he was “devastated, sick to my stomach” after learning of Peterson’s inaction during the school shooting that left 17 people dead. The sheriff said he believes Peterson remained outside the building for roughly four minutes, while the shooting in total lasted around six minutes. Israel said the officer never fired his weapon.

“What matters is that when we, in law enforcement, arrive at an active shooter, we go in and address the target,” the sheriff said. “And that’s what should’ve been done.”

When asked what Peterson should have done, Israel said the deputy should have “went in, addressed the killer, killed the killer.”

He added: “There are no words. I mean, these families lost their children…I’ve been to the funerals…I’ve been to the vigils. It’s just, ah, there are no words.”

Peterson resigned Thursday after video surveillance showed he never entered the school, even though he “clearly” knew there was a shooting taking place, officials said.

Officer Tim Burton of the Coral Springs Police Department, who responded to the shooting, told the New York Times that Peterson “was seeking cover behind a concrete column leading to a stairwell.”

By Nicole Darrah, Gregg Re, Lucia I. Suarez Sang

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School Protectors – The Time Has Arrived to Put Military Guards at Schools

February 22, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

It’s time to employ School Protectors.

Because we live in a sick society where human life has such little value and so many Americans have been stripped of their humanity (see our article Liberals Have Created Murder Monsters of February 16, 2018), our schools have become defenseless shooting galleries for any psychotic idiot who gets his hands on a firearm.

Let’s just say up front that anyone who suggests that gun control legislation will protect our children from shooters is out of touch with reality, and cares more about a political philosophy than protecting our children.

Because schools are gun-free zones (another failed liberal idea), psychotic child killers use them as their personal killing fields, launching them into eternal infamy without any resistance.

Reluctantly, we must face the fact that schools are no longer safe places to send our defenseless children. They must now be hardened.

Arming teachers and coaches is one idea I heard the President discussing today. That’s good–so long as you can find teachers willing to pack heat during the day.

We have National Guard and Military personnel who are available and on the payroll already. I suggest that we assign at least two to each school, to be on active patrol throughout the school day.

Of course, many don’t like the idea of uniformed officers patrolling our schools carrying fully automatic weapons (real assault weapons–not the single shot AR-15s that the media tell us are assault weapons). I would agree that full military uniform could give a militaristic flavor to our schools that we don’t want. However, undercover Air Marshall style guards simply won’t blend into the youth environment. I would suggest a uniform that looks much more civilian, yet is easily recognizable as a School Protector.

Not only will School Protectors harden our schools to would-be shooters, who will no longer have unrestricted access to shoot defenseless children by the dozens before responders can arrive, but their very presence will have a calming effect on every campus, making it essentially bully-free. After all, as we say, an armed population is a polite population.

By James Thompson

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DOJ: No Russian Collusion with GOP, 13 Russian Nationals Indicted for Interfering in US Elections

February 16, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

A federal grand jury on Friday indicted 13 Russians and three Russian companies for allegedly interfering in the 2016 presidential election, in a case brought by Special Counsel Robert Mueller that detailed a sophisticated plot to wage “information warfare” against the U.S.

The Russian nationals are accused of setting a “strategic goal to sow discord in the U.S. political system, including the 2016 presidential election.”

The indictment – the first filed against Russian nationals as part of Mueller’s probe – effectively returns focus to the meddling activities out of Russia in the run-up to the 2016 election, following a string of charges relating to the actions of Trump associates.

Former Department of Justice official Robert Driscoll comments on the indictment of 13 Russian nationals and three Russian companies for attempting to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Further, the DOJ made clear that the indictment does not allege that any of the interference changed the outcome of the presidential race.

“There is no allegation in this indictment that any American was a knowing participant in this illegal activity. There is no allegation in the indictment that the charged conduct altered the outcome of the 2016 election,” Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees the special counsel probe, said at a Friday press conference.

President Trump reacted to the indictments by seizing on Rosenstein’s comment that the election results were not impacted by the Russians’ activity.

“Russia started their anti-US campaign in 2014, long before I announced that I would run for President,” Trump tweeted. “The results of the election were not impacted. The Trump campaign did nothing wrong – no collusion!”

The 37-page indictment, signed by Mueller, said the actions detailed by prosecutors date back to 2014.

The defendants are accused of spreading derogatory information about Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, denigrating Republican candidates Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio — and ultimately supporting Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders and then-Republican candidate Donald Trump.

“There is no allegation in the indictment that the charged conduct altered the outcome of the 2016 election.”

– Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein

It says the defendants spread derogatory information about various candidates throughout the 2016 campaign and by “early to mid-2016” were supporting Trump’s presidential campaign.

Rosenstein, though, said that after the election, the group worked both to stage rallies in favor of President-elect Trump and in opposition to his election.

Rosenstein on Friday described a sophisticated operation by Russian organization Internet Research Agency. He said the scheme involved setting up hundreds of social media accounts using stolen or fictitious identities to make it appear like the accounts were controlled by individuals in the U.S. He said the defendants posed as politically active Americans and recruited “real Americans” to stage rallies and engage in political activities.

But Rosenstein said those Americans did not know they were communicating with Russians.

Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein says the defendants posed as politically and socially active Americans to engage in informational warfare during presidential election and the early days of the Trump administration; no allegation in indictment that any American had knowledge of Russian activities.

“We have known that Russians meddled in the election, but these indictments detail the extent of the subterfuge,” House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said. “These Russians engaged in a sinister and systematic attack on our political system. It was a conspiracy to subvert the process, and take aim at democracy itself.”

Democrats on Capitol Hill, though, reacted by continuing to suggest that people associated with Trump or his campaign could have been involved in Russia’s meddling.

“It is imperative that the Special Counsel investigation be allowed to continue to follow the facts on the Trump-Russia scandal, unhindered by the White House or Republicans in Congress,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said. “The American people deserve to know the full extent of Russia’s interference in our election and the involvement of Trump officials.”

The president ignored shouted questions from reporters as he departed the White House for Florida on Friday afternoon.

But in a statement released by the White House, Trump said “We cannot allow those seeking to sow confusion, discord, and rancor to be successful.”

“It’s time we stop the outlandish partisan attacks, wild and false allegations, and far-fetched theories, which only serve to further the agendas of bad actors, like Russia, and do nothing to protect the principles of our institutions,” he said. “We must unite as Americans to protect the integrity of our democracy and our elections.”

James Trusty says there's no indication that the U.S. government will pursue extradition for Russian nationals indicted for attempting to interfere in the presidential election. Video

Former DOJ official: 13 Russian nationals won’t face justice

READ THE INDICTMENT OF RUSSIAN NATIONALS

According to the special counsel, the indictment charges the defendants with conspiracy to defraud the United States, three defendants with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and bank fraud and five defendants with aggravated identity theft.

The three entities charged in the indictment are Internet Research Agency LLC, Concord Management and Consulting LLC and Concord Catering.

The 13 Russians charged are: Yevgeniy Viktorovich Prigozhin; Mikhail Ivanovich Bystrov; Mikhail Leonidovich Burchik; Aleksandra Yuryevna Krylova; Anna Vladislavovna Bogacheva; Sergey Pavlovich Polozov; Maria Anatolyrvna Bovda; Robert Sergetevich Bovda; Dzheykhun Nasimi Ogly; Vadim Vladimirovich Podkopaev; Gleb Igorevich Vasilchenko; Irina Viktorovna Kaverzina and Vladimir Venkov.

The indictment says Internet Research Agency registered with the Russian government as a corporate entity in 2013. It employed hundreds of individuals for its online operations and had an annual budget equaling millions of U.S. dollars, the filing said.

Prosecutors accuse the Russians of communicating with a real U.S. person affiliated with a Texas-based grassroots organization. They learned from that person to focus their activities on “purple states like Colorado, Virginia and Florida,” the indictment says.

It also says the group’s employees – referred to as “specialists” – created social media accounts to look like they were operated by Americans. They created group pages on Facebook and Instagram with names like “Secured Borders,” “Blacktivist” (to promote the Black Lives Matter movement), “United Muslims of America,” “Army of Jesus,” “South United” and “Heart of Texas.”

They also created and controlled numerous Twitter accounts, like one named “Tennessee GOP” under the @TEN_GOP handle that attracted more than 100,000 followers.

According to the indictment, the specialists were instructed to post content online that criticized “Hillary and the rest (except Sanders and Trump – we support them).”

It said they used pro-Trump, anti-Clinton hashtags online like “#Trump2016,” “#TrumpTrain,” “#MAGA,” “#IWontProtectHillary,” and “Hillary4Prison.”

It says the defendants, around the latter half of 2016, encouraged minority groups in the United States not to vote in the election or vote for a third party candidate. An Instagram account they controlled called “Woke Blacks” posted a message on Oct. 16, 2016 that read: “We cannot resort to the lesser of two devils. Then we’d surely be better off without voting AT ALL.”

The special counsel’s office also said Friday that an American, Richard Pinedo, 28, of Santa Paula, Calif., pleaded guilty Feb. 12 to identity fraud as part of its investigation. A filing from prosecutors said Pinedo sold bank account numbers over the internet.

By Alex Pappas, Judson Berger | Fox News Alex Pappas is a politics reporter at FoxNews.com. Follow him on Twitter at @AlexPappas.. Fox News’ Jake Gibson contributed to this report.

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Liberals Have Created Murder Monsters

February 16, 2018 By Editor 1 Comment

America watched in horror as 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz murdered 17 students and faculty at his former Florida high school. Predictably, progressives, liberals and leftists began beating the same old “gun control” drums. They have been floating extravagant claims that this was actually the 18th such murderous attack at schools in just the first 6 weeks in 2018. If only Congress would pass a law, these murderous attacks would stop–that is the leftist mantra.

CHALLENGE: Liberals–tell us now; what law could Congress pass to prevent the murderous attacks on children and young adults in America?

Over the past 48 hours this question has been posed hundreds of times on television and radio programs, and not one leftist has been able to articulate a workable piece of legislation that would eliminate these murders, including mass murder rampages in “no gun” zones like schools.

Fact: Around 330 million guns are owned by approximately 110 million Americans. Most citizens that own firearms are never involved in a gun violence incident (0.02%)

Fact: The cities in America with the strictest gun control laws also have the highest gun violence and murder rates.

Fact: Almost all of those who commit murder in America, especially carried out with gun violence, are young men who supported Barack Obama for president.

Fact: Total gun violence last year was 61,500 incidents, resulting in 15,590 deaths, and 31,183 injuries. The greatest part of these were black-on-black criminals, in liberal cities with strict gun control laws.

Fact: Assault weapons ARE UNLAWFUL in America. The AR-15 rifle is not an assault weapon, or even an automatic weapon. Although consumers like it’s quasi-military look–it is just a one-shot at a time rifle.

Look at the last few generations that liberalism in America have created. Children are raised with no allegiance to country–they are taught by Hollywood, Nightly News, Television Shows, Liberal Politicians, Teachers and Professors (collectively, Leftists) that America is evil, created by slave-owners to exploit minorities. Children are taught by Leftists that there is no God. Children are taught by Leftists that they are victims, and are owed something by society. Children are taught by Leftists that they should not work hard or try to excel–that they will be fully rewarded and compensated for merely showing up. Children are taught by Leftists that they are the most important person in the world, and that they should be revered and treated as a celebrity. Children are taught by Leftists that pornography is good, that abortion is good, that drugs are good, that violent video games are good, and that promiscuity and homosexuality are good. Children are taught by Leftists that family, parents, church and service to others are bad.

When I was young, most families owned a gun, and most young men received training in how to use firearms. This training was offered at schools, at scouts, and by local gun enthusiast organizations. There were very few gun violence incidents during that time.

Clearly, gun control laws, or the lack of more of them, are not the answer. What is the answer? If liberals are serious about stopping or even slowing gun violence in America, to curb the greatest volume of gun violence they should begin be keeping guns out of the hands of young urban minority males–the people who actually commit most of the murders. Of course, they protest that this is racial profiling–which only tells us that they aren’t buying their own BS about gun control.

The real answer is to reverse the tide of Leftist propaganda in America. Reverse the anti-God, Anti-Christian, Anti-Family, Anti-American, Anti-Personal Responsibility instruction that the Left has been force-feeding our children, and begin to teach them to be productive, responsible citizens again.

Any takers?

I didn’t think so.

By James Thompson

 

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DACA: What’s in It for Americans or the GOP?

February 8, 2018 By Editor 1 Comment

NOTHING.

First, ask yourself how an American citizen would fare sneaking over the border of France, Spain, Switzerland, Canada or even Mexico. Would you be able to sign up for welfare benefits? Would you be allowed to get a house and just stay there? Could you get work on the side? Would your children be treated for free in their hospitals? Would you ever receive citizenship, or the right to vote–or even a driver’s license? Of course not. That’s not how any other nation in the world handles border-crashers. So what is the impetus for making America an open-borders nation?

One may ask why Democrats are so insistent on continually representing the interests of everyone BUT average working Americans. They are just a little too quick to spend their energy on border-crashers. It is well-known that if they had the power, they would award instant citizenship to everyone within our borders, including those who broke our immigration law to be here.

The children brought into the country unlawfully with those border-crashers are commonly referred to as DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) recipients. DACA was a Democratic Party  scheme to keep this class of non-citizen in the country as long as possible (hence, “delayed”), while they worked on convincing the American people that these non-citizens should be allowed to remain, and even gain certain “rights.”

Of course, the main right that interests the Democrats is the right to vote–for Democrats.

Do illegal aliens tend to support Democrats more than they support Republicans? Of course–overwhelmingly. Why? Because Democrats have spoon fed them government benefits, despite the fact that they are not entitled to such benefits–supplied on the backs of taxpaying American workers. They have cultivated the political support of this non-citizen class, promising every benefit of citizenship in return for a promise of political support when the time arrives. As motor-voter and other types of expanded voter registration schemes rise in popularity, it is obvious that it is only a matter of time until every warm body will get a vote before the Democrats are done. All of those beautiful Democrat votes . . .

So what’s in the deal for American citizens? There is no benefit–only the burden of so many of these people collecting benefits from the American taxpayer. A surprisingly small percentage of illegal aliens receive no benefits. Although a number of DACA recipients are productive people, the vast majority are not.

The follow up question is what’s in a DACA deal for the GOP? Again, the GOP can only suffer by adding millions of Democratic Party voters to the voting rolls. There is no upside. So why is the GOP so anxious to make a DACA deal? They have always had a self-destructive need to be “liked.” That’s the only idea that comes to me. Self-destruction.

PUBLIUS

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DNC BROKE: Dem Fundraising Dead as GOP Flush Ahead of Midterm Elections

February 4, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

The Democratic National Committee entered the midterm elections year “dead broke,” with a paltry $400,000 in party coffers, according to federal records.

The committee finished 2017 with roughly $6.5 million in available cash and about $6.1 million in debt, according to recently released Federal Election Commission filings. That leaves a balance of just $422,582 to start a year that will culminate in midterm elections, in which Democrats are hoping to recapture a majority in the House.

The DNC’s fundraising challenges have been well known since shortly after the 2016 elections, when President Trump defeated front-running Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. The committee has been rocked by turmoil, including the resignation of chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz amid leaked emails some say showed DNC brass “rigged” the primaries so Clinton would defeat Sen. Bernie Sanders.

In addition, the selection in February 2017 of former Obama administration official Tom Perez to replace Wasserman Schultz, over Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison, sparked discord about the party continuing to hew to its establishment power base. More recently, the DNC has emerged as a key figure in the Russia collusion investigation, amid revelations it helped fund the so-called “anti-Trump” dossier that apparently led, at least in part, to the start of the probe.

Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez speaks at Ralph Northam’s election night rally on the campus of George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, November 7, 2017.  (REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein)

Party officials say the funding figures are not as dire as they may appear, as donors are more likely to give to individual candidates than to monolithic groups like the DNC or its counterpart, the Republican National Committee.

“Democratic candidates across the country are out-hustling and out-organizing Republican incumbents, many of whom have not faced a competitive challenge in a very long time and are struggling to find those old campaign muscles,” the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee said Friday, pointing to Republican incumbents trailing their Democratic challengers in fundraising in dozens of House races.

Still, the DNC’s money woes come at critical time, as it tries to retake the House and mount a longshot bid to retake the Senate.

RNC on track for record year in fundraising as DNC hits historic low in November; reaction on 'Outnumbered.' Video

Marie Harf: DNC has to rebuild its image before 2020

The RNC raised $132 million through last year, double the DNC’s $66 million, which along with group’s minimal cash led The Intercept reporter Ryan Grim, among the first to report the story, to tweet that the DNC is “dead  broke.

Democratic Party aides said in response to the new numbers that the DNC’s 2017 haul was more than what the party raised in previous off-election years, including the year ahead of the 2006 midterms, when Democrats regained control of Congress and years when former President Barack Obama helped raise money.

By Joseph Weber | Fox News The Associated Press contributed to this story.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Religion, Sci-Tech

Trump: Declassified FISA Memo ‘Vindicates’ Him, Shows Russia Investigation a ‘Witch Hunt’

February 4, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

President Trump said the recently released memo alleging intelligence abuse during the FBI investigation into the 2016 Trump campaign “totally vindicates” him.

Among his first statements following Friday’s release of the now-declassified memo by Republicans in control of the House Intelligence Committee, Trump suggested Saturday the revelations in the document prove the ongoing probe is a “witch hunt.”

“This memo totally vindicates ‘Trump’ in probe,” Trump tweeted Saturday. “But the Russian Witch Hunt goes on and on. Their [sic] was no Collusion and there was no Obstruction (the word now used because, after one year of looking endlessly and finding NOTHING, collusion is dead). This is an American disgrace!”

The four-page memo, written by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., alleges intelligence abuse by the Department of Justice and the FBI during the 2016 presidential campaign. Particularly, it alleges that the two agencies requested a surveillance warrant using a disputed anti-Trump dossier funded by Democrats.

The memo said former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe testified to the committee that “no surveillance warrant would have been sought” from the FISA court “without the Steele dossier information.”

The memo said it was not disclosed that the dossier was authored by an outspoken Trump critic and former British spy, Christopher Steele.

“What’s going on in this country, I think it is a disgrace,” the president said at the White House after the memo was released. “When you look at that, and you see that, and so many other things what’s going on, a lot of people should be ashamed of themselves, and much worse than that.”

Nunes told Fox News’ Bret Baier on Friday that the release of the memo was out of “an obligation to the American people.”

“I have an obligation to the American people when we see FISA abuse,” Nunes said on “Special Report.” “These are secret courts that exist to target for foreigners, for catching terrorists, for catching people who might be bad actors and the American citizens that are represented before this court have to be protected, and the only place that can protect them is the U.S. Congress when abuses do occur.”

Trump has repeatedly argued that the investigation – which was taken by special counsel Robert Mueller in May – that the probe has found no collusion from his campaign and should be concluded.

Prior to the release of the memo Friday, Trump tweeted: “The top Leadership and Investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans – something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago. Rank & File are great people!”

Joseph Weber

By Joseph Weber | Fox News

Fox News’ Paulina Dedaj contributed to this report.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Religion, Sci-Tech

READ FULL TEXT OF FISA MEMO

February 2, 2018 By Editor 2 Comments

Below is the full the of the FISA Memo, just released:

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Sci-Tech

FISA Memo is Declassifed

February 2, 2018 By Editor Leave a Comment

BREAKING-FISA MEMO has been declassified by the House Intelligence Committee.

House memo states disputed dossier was key to FBI’s FISA warrant to surveil members of Team Trump

READ FULL TEXT OF FISA MEMO>>

Excerpts Released – A disputed dossier was used by the FBI to obtain a warrant to spy on members of the Trump team, and the FISA court was never told the dossier was political opposition research, according to a House Intelligence Committee memo expected to be released in full today.

A memo that shows alleged government surveillance abuse  includes testimony from a high-ranking government official who says without the infamous Trump dossier, the FBI and DOJ would not have secured surveillance warrants to spy on at least one member of the Trump team, Fox News has learned.

According to sources, the memo, which has been at the center of an intense power struggle between congressional Republicans, has been declassified ahead of its expected release later Friday.

It also claims the FBI and DOJ used media reporting to lend credibility to the dossier, while the firm behind the dossier, Fusion GPS, briefed major American news outlets to include New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, New Yorker, Yahoo and Mother Jones.

The memo shoes that after former British spy Christopher Steele was cut off from the FBI, he continued to pass information, as did Fusion GPS, through Justice Department Official Bruce Ohr.  Ohr’s wife Nellie began working for Fusion GPS as early as May 2016.

It also claims evidence that Steele has a personal animus for the President Trump.

READ FULL TEXT OF FISA MEMO>>

The impending release of the four-page memo comes after the House Intelligence Committee voted earlier this week, over Democratic objections, to make the document public. This led to a rare and stunning rebuke from the bureau, which said Wednesday they had “grave concerns about material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo’s accuracy.”

The memo includes alleged abuses involving FISA, or the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

In a last-ditch objection, the top Democrat on the House committee claimed overnight that Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., had made “material changes” to the memo that was sent to the White House for review.

But Nunes’ office described the changes as minor and blasted the complaint as a “bizarre distraction from the abuses detailed in the memo.”

The White House has backed the memo’s release, calling for “transparency.”

READ FULL TEXT OF FISA MEMO>>

Earlier Friday, President Trump unleashed an early-morning tweet at a Justice Department he said has been “politicized” by Democrats.

GOP-led House investigators believe the FBI used a dubious dossier, initially prepared as campaign opposition research for Hillary Clinton’s presidential bid, to get permission from a secret federal court to eavesdrop on Trump campaign and transition team communications.

“The top Leadership and Investigators of the FBI and the Justice Department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of Democrats and against Republicans – something which would have been unthinkable just a short time ago,” Trump wrote. “Rank & File are great people!”

READ FULL TEXT OF FISA MEMO>>

Just more than two weeks, Republican lawmakers first drew attention to the memo, with some calling it “shocking,” “troubling” and “alarming” and one likening the details to KGB activity in Russia. They argued the memo should be immediately made public, leading to a social media #ReleaseTheMemo campaign.

Fox News’ Judson Berger and Brooke Singman contributed to this report

Catherine Herridge is an award-winning Chief Intelligence correspondent for FOX News Channel (FNC) based in Washington, D.C. She covers intelligence, the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security. Herridge joined FNC in 1996 as a London-based correspondent.

Alex Pappas is a politics reporter at FoxNews.com. Follow him on Twitter at @AlexPappas.

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Sci-Tech

MSNBC Host Mika Brzezinski: “Our Job” is to “Control Exactly What People Think”

February 1, 2018 By Editor 1 Comment

While a panel of news anchors was discussing President Trump’s attacks of the mainstream media, urging the American public to remain skeptical of the press, Brzezinski proclaimed that Americans may begin to trust Trump over the press.

The MSNBC host recently lamented the influence President Trump has in influencing the American agenda:

“Well, I think the dangerous edges here are that he’s trying to undermine the media, trying to make up his own facts, and it could be that while unemployment and the economy worsens, he could have undermined the messaging…”

Still think that MSM is “real news”? According to MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski, it’s their job to control “exactly what people think,” too. Yes, that’s right—one of the most popular anchors at a major mainstream news conglomerate literally just said it’s the media’s job to control exactly what people think.

[pullquote]Mika Brzezinski: “…so much that he could control exactly what people think…and that is our job.”[/pullquote]

And yet, somehow, people keep saying that Trump’s supporters are putting out fake news. They attack Breitbart, they attack Silence is Consent, they attack Info Wars, and they attack our movement.

Can people not see the hypocrisy of the MSM? They literally aren’t even trying to hide it anymore—Mika Brzezinski literally says that it’s “our job,” to “control exactly what people think.”

By Jon Anthony

Filed Under: All Stories, Economy, Elections, Entitlement, Ethics, Foreign, Gender, Religion, Sci-Tech

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