For the First Time, Federal Court Explicitly Establishes Filming Police as a Right

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There’s been an ongoing battle between police and the citizenry over who has the right to film in public. Disputes between police and the public have led to cameras being confiscated by police, and citizens being manhandled, beaten, and arrested. Now, it seems, the courts are weighing in, and not on the side of police.

The court’s opinion comes from a federal civil rights lawsuit filed by Phillip Turner vs. Driver, Grinald, and Dyess (2017). The plaintiffs are all officers from Ft. Worth, Texas. According to court documents, “Plaintiff-Appellant Phillip Turner was video recording a Fort Worth police station from a public sidewalk across the street when Defendants-Appellees Officers Grinalds and Dyess approached him and asked him for identification. Turner refused to identify himself, and the officers ultimately handcuffed him and placed him in the back of a patrol car.”

Prior to this case, there was no clear precedent that specifically established filming the police as a First Amendment right. In fact, as we’ve reported before, U.S. District Judge Mark Kearney of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania issued a ruling last year stating that citizens do not have a First Amendment right to record the police in public.

According to the recent precedent:

At the time in question, neither the Supreme Court nor this court had determined whether First Amendment protection extends to the recording or filming of police. Although Turner insists, as some district courts in this circuit have concluded, that First Amendment protection extends to the video recording of police activity in light of general First Amendment principles, the Supreme Court has “repeatedly” instructed courts “not to define clearly established law at a high level of generality”: “The general proposition, for example, that an unreasonable search or seizure violates the Fourth Amendment is of little help in determining whether the violative nature of particular conduct is clearly established.” Thus, Turner’s reliance on decisions that “clarified that [First Amendment] protections . . . extend[] to gathering information” does not demonstrate whether the specific act at issue here—video recording the police or a police station—was clearly established.

The court went on to note that police nor Turner had a precedent to reference in which filming cops was specifically protected as a First Amendment right.

In light of the absence of controlling authority and the dearth of even persuasive authority, there was no clearly established First Amendment right to record the police at the time of Turner’s activities.

Now there is.

In the recent ruling, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals weighed in on the citizens’ rights to film police movement, activities and buildings. The court determined,

“We conclude that First Amendment principles, controlling authority, and persuasive precedent demonstrate that a First Amendment right to record the police does exist, subject only to reasonable time, place, and manner restrictions.” The court set the first ever precendent giving citizens the right to film police, within reason, of course. In other words, the court believes the public has a right to film police so long as it is within reason, in public, and not in private. Going further, the court seemed to empathize with the public’s demand for a transparent government. They wrote, “speech is an essential mechanism of democracy, for it is the means to hold officials accountable to the people. The right of citizens to inquire, to hear, to speak, and to use information to reach consensus is a precondition to enlightened self-government and a necessary means to protect it.”

Turner asserted his First Amendment rights were violated when he was disallowed from filming the police station he was recording. For refusing to provide identification when asked, Turner was detained, handcuffed, and placed into the back of a squad car —an action he contends was a violation of his fourth amendment rights to unreasonable search and seizure and arrest.

When the supervisor arrived, Turner told him he was aware of his rights to withhold his identity. The supervisor agreed, he was given back his camera and allowed to leave. Unfortunately, the court’s ruling was not put in place prior to his case, or else he would have been allowed to continue filming and free to come and go as he pleased. Even though he never was sent to jail, his detainment was a form of arrest, a contention he raises going further with his case.

While the Texas precedent is not a national precedent, those who are attempting to film the police can, nonetheless, cite the precedent in the hopes police officers will continue to allow them to film without being impeded. Until such time as the Supreme Court weighs in on the matter, the right to film police will still continue to be a matter of contention between the police and the public, and dealt with on a state by state basis.

For his part, Turner appears to welcome the challenge to take his case all the way to the Supreme Court. We reached out to Turner for comment but have not yet heard back from him as of the writing of this article. But he did post a comment to his Facebook page. “5th circuit established, is the Supreme Court next??,” he stated, apparently feeling the weight of his victory in court.

If you or someone you know is planning to attempt to film cops, here are some things you need to know. According to the ACLU’s guide to photographing in public:

Taking photographs and video of things that are plainly visible in public spaces is a constitutional right—and that includes transportation facilities, the outside of federal buildings, and police and other government officials carrying out their duties.

Unfortunately, law enforcement officers have been known to ask people to stop taking photographs of public places. Those who fail to comply have sometimes been harassed, detained, and arrested. Other people have ended up in FBI databases for taking innocuous photographs of public places.

The right of citizens to record the police is a critical check and balance. It creates an independent record of what took place in a particular incident, one that is free from accusations of bias, lying, or faulty memory. It is no accident that some of the most high-profile cases of police misconduct have involved video and audio records.

As for video, the ACLU recommends;

No matter who you are you have the First Amendment right to:

Peacefully assemble and protest in public spaces and photograph and videotape the police or anything else in a public space.

Here’s the deal:

Public spaces include streets, sidewalks, and public parks.

Private property owners can set rules for public entry (like a theater saying “no cell phones”).

The right to take photos does not give you the right to:

Go places you’re not otherwise allowed, record audio of other people’s private, conversations, trespass, or interfere with police engaged in legitimate law enforcement operations.

Police officers may not: confiscate or demand to view your digital photos or videos without a warrant, or delete your photos or videos under any circumstances.

If you’re stopped or detained for taking photos:

Be polite.

Don’t resist.

Ask, “Am I free to go?”

If the officer says “no,” you are being detained.

If you are detained, ask what crime you’re suspected of committing.

Until you ask to leave, being stopped is considered voluntary.

It’s perfectly reasonable and acceptable to remind the police officer that “taking photographs is your First Amendment right” and “does not constitute reasonable suspicion of criminal activity” according to the American Civil Liberties Union. (For more from the author of “For the First Time, Federal Court Explicitly Establishes Filming Police as a Right” please click HERE)

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Conservatives Use Clout to Press for Full Repeal of Obamacare

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Conservatives in the House and Senate are leveraging their numbers in an attempt to influence the direction of legislation repealing Obamacare and ramp up the pressure on Republican leadership to bring a 2015 repeal bill back before members for another vote.

Their efforts began Monday night when Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Mike Lee of Utah, and Rand Paul of Kentucky said in a series of coordinated tweets, and later a joint statement, that they would support only a “full repeal” of Obamacare.

They were joined by three key House conservatives—Republican Study Committee Chairman Mark Walker of North Carolina, Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows of North Carolina, and former Freedom Caucus Chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio—in opposing a draft of the repeal they called “Obamacare-lite.”

“We have the votes to now tell the leadership this is what we want to do,” Paul said during a conference call with reporters Thursday. “We do have the votes. We’re a force to be reckoned with, and we want to be part of the negotiation over trying to make sure that we have complete repeal.”

The conservatives are rebelling against the draft bill leaked last week and instead want GOP leaders to revive the successful repeal bill from 2015 and bring it before members for a new vote.

That legislation passed both chambers of Congress, but President Barack Obama vetoed it in January 2016.

The 2015 bill repealed key provisions of the Affordable Care Act, including the individual and employer mandates, Medicaid expansion, tax credits, and taxes. It also stripped Planned Parenthood of federal funding.

But GOP leaders haven’t committed to that wording and instead say they want to include parts of a replacement plan in the bill dismantling the health care law.

Republicans will use a budget tool called reconciliation to repeal Obamacare; reconciliation fast-tracks legislation through the Senate and allows it to pass with 51 votes.

With control of 52 seats in the Senate, Republican leaders view reconciliation as the best way to repeal the health care law, especially since the legislation would earn President Donald Trump’s signature once it lands on his desk.

The GOP has a slim margin in the 100-member Senate, so Paul and his fellow conservatives are hoping to use their numbers to extract concessions from Republican leaders.

Since Vice President Mike Pence can break a tie, Republicans can lose no more than two votes.

“There have been rumors and rumblings of those in leadership putting forward something that is not a complete repeal, that some of us would refer to as Obamacare-lite,” Paul said. “We are for complete repeal.”

The same situation is unfolding in the House, where the bill fails if Republicans lose more than 20 votes.

The House Freedom Caucus stands roughly 40 members strong. If the entire group of conservative members opposed legislation repealing less of Obamacare than the 2015 reconciliation bill did, it wouldn’t pass the lower chamber, where Republicans have 238 seats.

When asked by The Daily Signal whether conservatives were worried their demand for the 2015 bill possibly would derail repeal efforts entirely, Jordan said the lawmakers weren’t concerned.

“We actually think you should do what you said you would do [in the 2016 campaign],” Jordan said.

“They didn’t tell us to repeal it, but keep the Medicaid expansion,” he said, referring to voters. “They didn’t tell us to repeal it, but keep this new tax increase. They didn’t tell us to repeal it and start a whole new entitlement program. They told us to repeal it and replace it.”

House Speaker Paul Ryan said last month that Republicans would vote on a repeal bill this month, but details of a proposal haven’t yet been released.

A draft bill to replace Obamacare was, however, leaked to the press last week.

It was that legislation that sparked the critical response from the six conservative lawmakers, who said the proposal amounted to “Obamacare-lite.”

The draft document would repeal Obamacare’s major provisions, with some aspects effective in 2020 and others sooner, and implement parts of a replacement centered around age-based tax credits.

The conservatives, though, said the draft document stopped short of full repeal and, through the refundable tax credits, would create a new entitlement program.

“The draft legislation, which was leaked last week, risks continuing major Obamacare entitlement expansions and delays any reforms,” Walker said in a statement.

“Worse still, the bill contains what increasingly appears to be a new health insurance entitlement with a Republican stamp on it,” the Republican Study Committee chairman said.

Now, House Republican leaders are distancing themselves from the draft replacement plan.

Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., told reporters at a press conference Tuesday that he had spoken to Walker, who said he couldn’t recommend the 170 members of the Republican Study Committee support the document.

“That draft is not even representative of where we are,” Scalise said. “[Walker is] working with us, and we’re in direct conversations with the chairman of the RSC as well as others about the best way to build a consensus to pass a bill to gut Obamacare.”

“That draft is no longer valid,” he said.

A spokesman for Scalise, the No. 3 House Republican, later told The Hill that the leaked document was an “older draft.”

For the last month, conservatives irked by the slow speed of repeal efforts have been pushing Republican leadership to pass a new bill with the 2015 language.

But although that language cleared both the House and Senate, some senators are skeptical about repealing Obamacare’s taxes and expansion of Medicaid eligibility.

Further compounding the divide between conservatives and their fellow Republicans is Trump, who has said the White House and new Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price would send their own Obamacare replacement plan to Capitol Hill.

Trump has yet to do that, and it isn’t clear when he will. But the president has advocated a simultaneous repeal and replacement of Obamacare, a strategy that some conservatives, Lee among them, said would be dangerous.

Jordan and Paul, though, said Congress should pass a repeal of Obamacare and Paul’s Obamacare Replacement Act the same day.

Though Trump, the House, and the Senate aren’t yet on the same page regarding the future of the health care law, Jordan appeared poised to deliver a message to the president during an interview Tuesday morning on Fox News’ “Fox and Friends,” a morning show Trump is known to watch.

“We make this job too hard,” Jordan said. “Let’s do what we told the voters.” (For more from the author of “Conservatives Use Clout to Press for Full Repeal of Obamacare” please click HERE)

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Washington Post: Fake News Partner With the CIA

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Let’s frame the situation in simple terms. You work for a company that has a very lucrative partnership with a big-time money man. That money man gives you a piece of information and tells you it’s important.

What you do every day is spread information. That’s how you earn your living.

Are you going to take that piece of info from the money man and spread it, or are you going to question it and research it and shoot back hard-edged questions to the money man?

If you’re a loyal employee, and if you want to keep your job, and if you’re smart enough to understand how things work, you’re going to spread the money man’s piece of info and keep your head down.

You’re not going to worry your pretty little head about whether the piece of info is true.

Unless you’re a complete dolt, you certainly aren’t going to spread the info with a disclaimer stating that your source, the money man, has a major business contract with your company.

Getting the picture? The truth is irrelevant.

Here are key statements from Norman Solomon’s AlterNet article about the Washington Post, its owner, Jeff Bezos, and the CIA (12/18/13):

“The Post’s new owner, Jeff Bezos, is the founder and CEO of Amazon — which recently landed a $600 million contract with the CIA. But the Post’s articles about the CIA are not disclosing that the newspaper’s sole owner is the main owner of CIA business partner Amazon.”

“Even for a multi-billionaire like Bezos, a $600 million contract is a big deal. That’s more than twice as much as Bezos paid to buy the Post four months ago.”

“And there’s likely to be plenty more where that CIA largesse came from. Amazon’s offer wasn’t the low bid, but it won the CIA contract anyway by offering advanced high-tech ‘cloud’ infrastructure.”

“Bezos personally and publicly touts Amazon Web Services, and it’s evident that Amazon will be seeking more CIA contracts. Last month, Amazon issued a statement saying, ‘We look forward to a successful relationship with the CIA’.”

“As Amazon’s majority owner and the Post’s only owner, Bezos stands to gain a lot more if his newspaper does less ruffling and more soothing of CIA feathers.”

“Amazon has a bad history of currying favor with the U.S. government’s ‘national security’ establishment. The media watch group FAIR pointed out what happened after WikiLeaks published State Department cables: ‘WikiLeaks was booted from Amazon’s webhosting service AWS. So at the height of public interest in what WikiLeaks was publishing, readers were unable to access the WikiLeaks website’.”

“How’s that for a commitment to the public’s right to know?”

“Days ago, my colleagues at RootsAction.org launched a petition that says: ‘The Washington Post’s coverage of the CIA should include full disclosure that the sole owner of the Post is also the main owner of Amazon — and Amazon is now gaining huge profits directly from the CIA’…”

“While the Post functions as a powerhouse media outlet in the Nation’s Capital, it’s also a national and global entity — read every day by millions of people who never hold its newsprint edition in their hands. Hundreds of daily papers reprint the Post’s news articles and opinion pieces, while online readership spans the world.”

“Propaganda largely depends on patterns of omission and repetition. If, in its coverage of the CIA, the Washington Post were willing to fully disclose the financial ties that bind its owner to the CIA, such candor would shed some light on how top-down power actually works in our society.”

“Bezos personally and publicly touts Amazon Web Services, and it’s evident that Amazon will be seeking more CIA contracts. Last month, Amazon issued a statement saying, ‘We look forward to a successful relationship with the CIA’.”

“As Amazon’s majority owner and the Post’s only owner, Bezos stands to gain a lot more if his newspaper does less ruffling and more soothing of CIA feathers.”

“Amazon has a bad history of currying favor with the U.S. government’s ‘national security’ establishment. The media watch group FAIR pointed out what happened after WikiLeaks published State Department cables: ‘WikiLeaks was booted from Amazon’s webhosting service AWS. So at the height of public interest in what WikiLeaks was publishing, readers were unable to access the WikiLeaks website’.”

“How’s that for a commitment to the public’s right to know?”

“Days ago, my colleagues at RootsAction.org launched a petition that says: ‘The Washington Post’s coverage of the CIA should include full disclosure that the sole owner of the Post is also the main owner of Amazon — and Amazon is now gaining huge profits directly from the CIA’…”

“While the Post functions as a powerhouse media outlet in the Nation’s Capital, it’s also a national and global entity — read every day by millions of people who never hold its newsprint edition in their hands. Hundreds of daily papers reprint the Post’s news articles and opinion pieces, while online readership spans the world.”

“Propaganda largely depends on patterns of omission and repetition. If, in its coverage of the CIA, the Washington Post were willing to fully disclose the financial ties that bind its owner to the CIA, such candor would shed some light on how top-down power actually works in our society.”

You may recall that the Washington Post was a main player in launching stories about fake news sites after the presidential election.

One of the biggest fake news outlets in the world (cough, the Washington Post) took the lead in “exposing fake news.”

Then, on January 8, 2017, the Post ran a piece headlined: “It’s time to retire the tainted term ‘fake news’”. That was an attempt to stop the bleeding, because independent news sites all over the world were pointing out that mainstream news outlets had long been the biggest purveyors of fake news. The Post writer, Margaret Sullivan, stated:

“But though the term [fake news] hasn’t been around long, its meaning already is lost. Faster than you could say ‘Pizzagate,’ the label has been co-opted to mean any number of completely different things…”

Actually, the term has been around for quite a while. I named my site nomorefakenews.com in 2001. And the term, in 2016, wasn’t “co-opted.” It was turned against news outlets, like the Post, who were attacking independent media.

The Post is in bed with the CIA to the tune of $600 million. If that isn’t the foundation of fakery on a grand scale, what is?

Try to find one major news outlet that has exposed and pounded on this Washington Post-CIA marriage. You can’t. You see, the fakers protect their own. It’s a club. If you join, you keep your mouth shut about the inherent unholy alliances within the club. It’s a rule.

Memo to the New York Times, LA Times, CNN, FOX, NBC, CBS, ABC, BBC, Reuters, AP: If you want to prove you’re not fake, go after the Washington Post, hammer and tongs, on their marriage to the CIA. Don’t let up. Demand conflict of interest statements from the Post, for starters.

And here’s a talking point for you. Was Jeff Bezos’ cash purchase of the Washington Post a mere coincidence, placed next to his $600 million contract with the CIA, or did he buy the Post so he could offer the CIA an even tighter relationship with the number-one paper of record?

Get it? Or am I going too fast for you? (For more from the author of “Washington Post: Fake News Partner With the CIA” please click HERE)

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Pence Highlights Administration’s Commitment to School Choice in Meeting With Black College Leaders

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Vice President Mike Pence stressed to a group of college administrators that the Trump administration is committed to greater education choice for elementary and high school students.

The vice president spoke Monday at the White House Historically Black Colleges and Universities 2017 Listening Session at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, near the White House. The bulk of his remarks were about the contributions of the more than 100 HBCUs in 19 states, and the administration’s desire to partner with the schools.

With Education Secretary Betsy DeVos attending, Pence also stressed the importance of improving education in a child’s early years.

“Secretary DeVos is dedicated to expanding opportunities through educational choice all across this country, ensuring that whether it’s a public school, a public charter school, or even a private school, that parents on an increasing basis are able to choose for their young children the school regardless of their income and area code,” Pence said.

Research has shown education choice to be particularly helpful to minority communities.

A Harvard study of New York City found minority students with scholarships “to attend private elementary schools in 1997 were, as of 2013, 10 percent more likely to enroll in college and 35 percent more likely than their peers in public school to obtain a bachelor’s degree.”

A Department of Education study of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program found participants had a 21 percentage point increase in graduation rates.

The Trump administration could be moving away from the policies of the Obama administration, which sought to defund the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, said Lindsey Burke, director of education policy studies at The Heritage Foundation.

Though, Burke added, the federal government is fairly limited in what it can do on the issue, aside from President Donald Trump, DeVos, and others using the bully pulpit to promote choice. The exception for a direct impact is the D.C. program, which is funded through Congress.

“Trump could do a lot as a sign of support and expand school choice in a big way by transitioning D.C. to an all choice system,” Burke told The Daily Signal.

During his first week in office, Trump issued a proclamation marking National School Choice Week, which said:

With a renewed commitment to expanding school choice for our children, we can truly make a great education possible for every child in America.

I commend our nation’s students, parents, teachers, and school leaders for their commitment to quality, effective education, and I call on states and communities to support effective education and school choice for every child in America.

As our country celebrates National School Choice Week, I encourage parents to evaluate the educational opportunities available for their children. I also encourage state lawmakers and federal lawmakers to expand school choice for millions of additional students.

(For more from the author of “Pence Highlights Administration’s Commitment to School Choice in Meeting With Black College Leaders” please click HERE)

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Trump’s Defense Proposal Would Boost a Languishing Military

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On Monday, President Donald Trump’s budget director, Mick Mulvaney, announced that the administration will seek a defense budget of $603 billion for 2018—“one of the largest increases in history.”

Trump said nondefense spending would be cut by an equal $54 billion, “the largest proposed reduction since the early years of the Reagan administration.”

The White House characterized the defense bump as a 10 percent increase. Both the percentage increase and the $54 billion figure refer back to the 2011 Budget Control Act caps for fiscal year 2018, which is $549 billion.

As is typical in Washington, nearly everyone can find something to be unhappy about in this proposal. As in most cases, the reality lies somewhere in the middle.

Reasons to View This Announcement Positively

As The Heritage Foundation reported in our 2017 Index of U.S. Military Strength, in the last five years, as a result of a diminishing budget and equipment overuse, the military has been sorely depleted. The Army is smaller than it has been since World War II, the Navy the smallest since World War I, and the Air Force the smallest since its existence.

And it’s not just smaller—it’s less ready. As the military service vice chiefs of staff testified in January, only three of the Army’s brigade combat teams are ready to fight today, one-quarter of Navy aircraft are flyable, and the Air Force is suffering from crippling pilot and maintenance personnel shortages.

Major weapon systems are also aging and not being replaced. The average age of Air Force aircraft is 27 years old, and the Army does not have the ability to replace its main battle tank, which is already 37 years old.

U.S. spending on national defense has declined to 16 percent of the federal budget from 32 percent in the early 1980s, constantly being squeezed lower by larger and larger entitlement spending. Similarly, the percentage of gross domestic product spent on national defense has declined to 3.2 percent from 6.8 percent in 1986.

In real constant dollars, the Department of Defense’s budget has declined by 24 percent since 2011. By any measure, America is not spending enough to sustain its military in these times of increasing global threats.

So any proposed increase in military spending is both welcome and sorely needed. Trump’s proposal to increase defense spending is helpful and represents a clear commitment. It is also encouraging that the president is willing to take on this fight to repeal the Budget Control Act caps and increase defense spending.

Just the Beginning

But this increase on its own is insufficient to begin the rebuilding. It simply represents an “on-ramp” to rebuilding.

The Obama administration had already planned to spend $584 billion in 2018 on defense, and the military services have already prepared detailed plans to spend that amount.

A 2018 budget of $603 billion represents an increase of 3 percent, not 10 percent, over the previous administration’s plans. An $18 billion increase will not be enough to regrow the military, rebuild near term readiness, and commence needed modernization programs.

And this recent announcement did not mention the 2018 “overseas contingency operations” account request, which must remain relatively the same as 2017’s in order to make real progress.

Heritage recommends a 2018 defense budget of $632 billion, with the additional implementation of $14 billion in savings we have proposed through various initiatives as well as a similar level of funding for overseas contingency operations.

Fully rebuilding the military will probably require more than can be reallocated from just discretionary spending, and in future years, more sources will be required.

Both Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, have correctly pointed out that this 2018 budget will not be sufficient to rebuild the military. Hopefully, working together, Congress and the administration can provide the necessary funds in 2018 and beyond to begin rebuilding the military.

In sum, the announcement of an increased defense budget for 2018 is good news for our military and nation. The deterioration of our armed forces did not happen overnight—it occurred over years, and to now rebuild it will similarly take years.

The president’s proposal is a welcome and necessary first step in that process, but more will be needed. (For more from the author of “Trump’s Defense Proposal Would Boost a Languishing Military” please click HERE)

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Video Clip Shows IRGC Support for Terror in America

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As Iran’s government claimed that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is widely known to be fighting terrorism in neighboring countries, a newly-emerged video clip purportedly shows an IRGC strategist threatening to unleash terror cells in the U.S., targeting nuclear missile launch facilities, among other things.

At a time when the Trump administration is considering listing the IRGC as a foreign terrorist organization, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said at the weekend U.S. efforts to sanction the organization have never benefited the U.S.

Zarif said the world at large agrees that the IRGC has extended the utmost support for neighboring countries in their fight against terrorism.

Iran is supporting Shi’a militias fighting alongside the Iraqi military against Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS/ISIL) jihadists. The IRGC is also heavily involved, in conjunction with Tehran’s Hezbollah allies and other Shi’a fighters, in supporting the Assad regime in the Syrian civil war, where combatants include Sunni nationalists, Kurds, Salafists, and ISIS and al-Qaeda affiliated jihadists.

The exiled Iranian opposition group National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) called Zarif’s claim that the IRGC fights terrorism “ridiculous.” (Read more from “Video Clip Shows IRGC Support for Terror in America” HERE)

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Ryan and Bannon Forge Unexpected Alliance on Border Tax

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House Speaker Paul Ryan has won over an unlikely ally to salvage his controversial tax plan: Steve Bannon.

Trump’s top strategist once described Ryan as “the enemy,” but now the former Breitbart News chief is the speaker’s best chance to win approval for his border-adjusted tax, which Republicans currently say has almost no hope of clearing the Senate.

In a handful of White House meetings, Ryan found that Bannon was perhaps the most enthusiastic backer of the border-adjustment plan, according to a senior administration official and a person familiar with the sessions.

A vigorous endorsement from Donald Trump could help save the border-adjustment plan, which is running into strong opposition from the energy industry and retailers. The retailers took the unusual step of launching an advertising campaign on the tax issue aimed at viewers of Fox News’ Fox and Friends and Saturday Night Live, TV programs Trump is known to watch. (Read more from “Ryan and Bannon Forge Unexpected Alliance on Border Tax” please click HERE)

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Trump: ‘Time Is Right for Immigration Bill,’ Open to Giving Some Legal Status

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President Donald Trump, who staked his campaign on a hard-line approach to illegal immigration, now says he is open to considering possible legal status for some undocumented immigrants as part of a compromise to overhaul the nation’s immigration system.

“The time is right for an immigration bill, as long as there is compromise on both sides,” Trump told news anchors and correspondents attending a White House luncheon today.

The president is floating the idea ahead of his first address to a joint session of Congress tonight, signaling a willingness to negotiate on an issue that has pitted Democrats against some Republicans for years. It was not immediately clear whether the president would raise the issue in his speech.

Trump indicated openness to moving beyond a strict focus on law enforcement to addressing the legal status of some of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. – including a possible path to citizenship for “DREAMers,” who were brought to the country illegally as children. (Read more from “Trump: ‘Time Is Right for Immigration Bill,’ Open to Giving Some Legal Status” please click HERE)

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Spain Takes Down Ex-Head of IMF; Dozens of Others Prosecuted in Enormous International Banking Corruption Scandal

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In many other countries, excluding the United States, corrupt bankers are often brought to task by their respective governments. The most recent example of a corrupt banker being held accountable comes our of Spain, in which the former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Rodrigo Rato was sentenced to four years and six months behind bars.

According to the AFP, Spain’s National Court, which deals with corruption and financial crime cases, said he had been found guilty of embezzlement when he headed up Caja Madrid and Bankia, at a time when both groups were having difficulties.

Rato, who is tied to a slew of other allegations was convicted and sentenced for misusing €12m between 2003 and 2012 — sometimes splashing out at the height of Spain’s economic crisis, according to the AFP.

The people of Spain were outraged over the scandal as it was discovered during the height of a severe financial crisis in which banks were receiving millions in taxpayer dollars. Bankia was eventually nationalized and given 22 billion in public money.

Although he was sentenced, Rato, who is also a former Spanish economy minister, remains at liberty pending a possible appeal because of highly connected elite status.

Rato was brought down in a massive effort by Spain to get rid of corruption within the banking system. The problem had gotten so bad, that Spain decided to clean house, and 65 people, include Rato, were brought to task.

According to the AFP, they were accused of having paid for personal expenses with credit cards put at their disposal by both Caja Madrid and Bankia, without ever justifying them or declaring them to tax authorities. These expenses included petrol for their cars, supermarket shopping, holidays, luxury bags or parties in nightclubs.

According to the indictment, Rato maintained the “corrupt system” established by his predecessor Miguel Blesa when he took the reins of Caja Madrid in 2010, reports the AFP. He then replicated the system when he took charge of Bankia, a group born in 2011 out of the merger of Caja Madrid with six other savings banks, prosecutors said.

According to the report:

Rato was economy minister and deputy prime minister in the conservative government of Jose Maria Aznar from 1996 to 2004, before going on to head up the IMF until 2007. His subsequent career as a banker was short-lived — from 2010 to 2012 — but apart from the credit cards case, it also led to another banking scandal considered the country’s biggest ever.

Thousands of small-scale investors lost their money after they were persuaded to convert their savings to shares ahead of the flotation of Bankia in 2011, with Rato at the reins. Less than a year later, he resigned as it became known that Bankia was in dire straits.

The state injected billions of euros but faced with the scale of Bankia’s losses and trouble at other banks, it asked the EU for a bailout for the banking sector and eventually received €41bn.

Rato and others were probed, accused of misleading small investors in the listing of Bankia, which has since paid out €1.2bn in compensation.

To highlight the utter corruption within the banking cartel that is the IMF, Rato is the third former chief to be ousted for illegal activity.

For those who don’t remember, Rato’s successor, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, was tried in 2015 on pimping charges in a lurid sex scandal. Naturally, he was acquitted — in spite of the fact that he admitted to engaging in illicit sex with prostitutes at a series of orgies that supposedly took place at the Hotel Carlton in the northern French city of Lille. The court sided with DSK and agreed that he had no idea the women he repeatedly filled the orgies with were being paid.

Christine Lagarde, who took over from Strauss-Kahn and is the current IMF chief, In December, was found guilty of “negligence” for approving a massive government payout to business tycoon Bernard Tapie during her tenure as French finance minister.

Despite being found guilty of corruption, Lagarde was not sentenced to a single day in jail. She has since been meeting with Trump’s Goldman Sachs-connected Treasury Secretary, Steven Mnuchin, noting that they’ve had “some very positive discussions.” (For more from the author of “Spain Takes Down Ex-Head of IMF; Dozens of Others Prosecuted in Enormous International Banking Corruption Scandal” please click HERE)

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Why Are U.S. Marshals Now Conducting Biometric Scans and Collecting Other Information on Americans as they LEAVE the United States?

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During the war on terrorism, Americans compromised their liberties to fight for freedom. Now, during the war on immigration, Americans will again be compelled to sacrifice liberties for American sovereignty.

In the name of security, anywhere, anytime. All measures will be justified, everyone will be authorized and the population will be controlled.

That is the moment we have arrived at in America.

A combination of policies that President Obama put into place, as well as fresh executive orders put in place by President Trump, have created a new front in the world of national security. They are now using biometrics to verify passport and identity, in the name of cracking down on immigration.

Additional scrutiny, and an over-bearing scent of Gestapo is again cropping up in airports, as yet another layer of surveillance is added to the line up.

Here’s a look at one version of the machines now being tested and phased in at airports and other checkpoints:

Both visitors from abroad, and American citizens alike have now been required to submit to biometric iris scans in order to board a flight. Wow.

via Jeffrey Tucker of the Foundation of Economic Education:

For some 15 years, airport security has become steadily more invasive. There are ever more checkpoints, ever more requests for documents as you make your way from the airport entrance to the airplane. Passengers adapt to the new changes as they come. But my latest flight to Mexico, originating in Atlanta, presented all passengers with something I had never seen before.

We had already been through boarding pass checks, passport checks, scanners, and pat downs. At the gate, each passenger had already had their tickets scanned and we were all walking on the jet bridge to board. It’s at this point that most people assume that it is all done: finally we can enjoy some sense of normalcy.

This time was different. Halfway down the jetbridge, there was a new layer of security. Two US Marshals, heavily armed and dressed in dystopian-style black regalia, stood next to an upright machine with a glowing green eye. Every passenger, one by one, was told to step on a mat and look into the green scanner. It was scanning our eyes and matching that scan with the passport, which was also scanned (yet again).

Like everyone else, I complied. What was my choice? I guess I could have turned back at the point, decline to take the flight I had paid for, but it would be unclear what would then happen. After standing there for perhaps 8 seconds, the machine gave the go signal and I boarded.

I talked to a few passengers about this and others were just as shaken by the experience. They were reticent even to talk about it, as people tend to be when confronted with something like this.

I couldn’t find anyone who had ever seen something like this before. I wrote friends who travel internationally and none said they had ever seen anything like this.

I will tell you how it made me feel: like a prisoner in my own country. It’s one thing to control who comes into a country. But surveilling and permissioning American citizens as they leave their own country, even as they are about to board, is something else.

This isn’t required for all flights, yet.

This writer encountered a Homeland Security / U.S. Customs and Border Protection test at select airports… they are still working out the kinks.

But the question is, after all the frustrations that Americans had with flying after 9/11, and watching their liberties sacrificed at the altar of security, after dealing with ridiculously long lines – are Americans now willing sacrifice even more liberties and submit their biometric scans?

Unfortunately, they may be.

As a general mass, Americans have proved underwhelming in their opposition to invasions of privacy on the part of private corporations, especially those online and in computing and communication devices. They have also shrugged off and become immune to fifteen years of airport harassment and additional checks and scans.

Now, iris scans might even one day make security faster – but it’s a devilish tradeoff, and an enormous trust of power an agency that was created into existence out of the 9/11 emergency atmosphere, and which grows only when feeding the machine fear and terror.

Update: a reader has pointed me to this page at Homeland Security:

As part of U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) border security mission, the agency is deploying new technologies to verify travelers’ identities – both when they arrive and when they leave the United States – by matching a traveler to the document they are presenting. CBP’s goal is to enhance national security and protect a traveler’s identity against theft through the use of biometrics.

Biometric information (such as finger, face, or iris) measures a person’s unique physical characteristics. CBP incorporated fingerprints for biometric identification and verification in 2004, and is now testing facial and iris imaging capabilities to help improve travelers’ identity protection, the integrity of our immigration system, and our national security.

I happened to be on the “one daily flight” that gets exit scanned.

[…]

What people don’t often consider is that every rule that pertains to immigration ultimately applies to emigration as well. Every rule that government has to treat immigrants a certain way also necessarily applies to citizens as well.

Chandran Kukathas is right when he says that “controlling immigration means controlling everyone.” (source)

It looks like their tests have so far met with very little resistance, and all signs green, as support for Trump’s new order of police, border, military and security agencies are given new mandates to enforce laws, and take necessary measures to control borders, verify individuals and protect the country. That’s the narrative, and Americans are cheering it on with very little forethought about the consequences it could hold.

For now, Americans are willing to accept new controls.

That is, if nobody reawakens to the massive civil liberties issue that is going on.

Welcome Aboard, But First US Marshals Will Scan Your Retina, BECAUSE YOU ARE NOT FREE

(For more from the author of “Why Are U.S. Marshals Now Conducting Biometric Scans and Collecting Other Information on Americans as the LEAVE the United States?” please click HERE)

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