Lawmakers in Both Houses of Congress Press Trump to Speed up Withdrawal From Syria

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A bipartisan group of 12 lawmakers from both the Senate and the House of Representatives have sent a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to expedite the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria.

This letter comes from a wildly divergent group of politicians ranging from Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, to Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortex, D-N.Y. Paul and Lee were the only senators to sign the letter.

In December, Trump announced that ISIS had been defeated and that the U.S. would be pulling all its troops out of Syria imminently. This announcement was followed immediately by the resignation of his former defense secretary, James Mattis, as well as confusion from commanders on the ground and dismay from Syrian Kurds.

The Kurds are an ethnic group without a country, spread over territory in Turkey, Syria, Iran, Iraq, and Armenia. The Turkish government has had trouble with a militant group of Kurds within its own borders and because of this has declared all ethnic Kurds to be terrorists. It has used the instability caused by the Syrian civil war to launch incursions against Kurdish cities, which has in turn pulled the Kurds away from helping the U.S. fight ISIS, a fight in which they’ve proven to be invaluable allies.

The plight of the Kurds presents a tricky dilemma to the Trump administration, which needs to find a way to protect U.S. allies from getting massacred without getting dragged into committing to the endless occupation of an unstable foreign country.

There’s also the question of whether or not ISIS is truly defeated to such an extent that it can’t rebuild itself.

The number of troops in Syria is expected to drop to 1,000 by early May and will eventually shrink to 400, the Pentagon announced on Friday.

In the letter, the senators and members of Congress told the president that they recommended “direct, robust engagement and coordination with both U.S. allies and other regional governments to ensure the safety of Syria’s civilian populations and avert the resurgence of ISIS.” They argued that “U.S. leverage — such as conditioning weapons sales to Turkey” could be effective in preventing Turkish forces from attacking U.S. Kurdish allies.

The U.S. has already tried to put conditions on the sale of F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, warning that the deal would be scrapped if the Turkish government did not agree to turn down a deal with Russia to buy S-400 missiles. This standoff has been going on for several months now, with no clear resolution in sight.

And while the letter is bipartisan, not everyone in Congress believes that a quick withdrawal of U.S. troops would be a good idea.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., sharply criticized the president’s decision to rapidly withdraw from Syria in a Facebook video from December, warning that while ISIS has been “significantly degraded,” it is “not fair or wise to say it has been defeated.” Conservative Review reached out to Rubio to get his opinion on this letter by his colleagues.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., also slammed the decision, calling it a “huge Obama-like mistake.”

The twelve congressional signatories to the letter are Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Reps. Ted Lieu, D-Calif., Justin Amash, R-Mich., Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., Jeff Duncan, R-S.C., Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., Thomas Massie, R-Ky., Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and Bill Posey, R-Fla. (For more from the author of “Lawmakers in Both Houses of Congress Press Trump to Speed up Withdrawal From Syria” please click HERE)

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McCain Institute Cozies up to Qatar Front Groups

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Cindy McCain, the widow of deceased Republican Sen. John McCain, and the McCain Institute have continued to cozy up to two shadowy front groups that work to advance the interests of a theocratic Middle Eastern regime.

Over the past few years, Mrs. McCain and the McCain Institute have ramped up partnerships on many fronts with the Sports Integrity Global Alliance (SIGA), which describes itself as an “independent coalition aiming to reform the integrity and governance of sport,” and its founder, the International Centre for Sport Security (ICSS), which claims to have similar goals.

Whistleblowers, however, have shown that while SIGA and ICSS claim to be sports-oriented organizations, they merely act as a front for more nefarious purposes. SIGA, which was formed by ICSS, a group that is entirely controlled by the nation of Qatar, has created tremendous inroads in the United States thanks to the support of the McCain family. Since SIGA’s 2017 founding, Cindy McCain and the McCain Institute have offered SIGA the legitimacy it needs to pursue further partnerships and collaboration with international brands such as Mastercard and Deloitte and high-profile international organizations like UNESCO.

Qatar’s continuing investments in the sports world hardly have anything to do with sports. As The New York Times explained in a seminal piece Thursday, sports is a key function of Qatar’s soft power strategy.

“Qatar’s investments — especially in luxury, sports and the arts — aren’t just about prestige and profits,” Giorgio Cafiero, who heads Washington-based consultancy Gulf State Analytics, tells the Times. “They are also about hearts and minds, and anchored in forging deep alliances that give outside players a greater stake in the continuation of Qatar as an independent state.”

Cindy McCain is a founding member of SIGA and currently sits on its SIGA council alongside Mohammed Hanzab, who chairs ICSS, which formed SIGA. It is unclear whether Mrs. McCain is paid to sit on the board of SIGA.

A few months ago, the McCain Institute, along with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and ICSS (the Qatari front group), co-hosted a “Securing Sport 2018” conference, which was supported by the Qatari Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The McCain Institute has for the past few years co-hosted other events with ICSS and SIGA, offering credibility to the Qatari front groups, which appear ultimately intended to expand Qatar’s influence abroad and protect its selection for the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

The McCain family ties to Qatar go back many years, but a strong bond began to form during the 2011 Arab Spring.

At a 2011 address at the U.S. Institute of Peace, Sen. McCain praised Qatar for its role in fostering the Arab Spring.

Unfortunately, the Arab Spring quickly became an Islamist Winter. The supposed democracy movement empowered Islamist and jihadi groups with the political momentum to topple U.S. allies and sow chaos in the region.

Over the next few years, McCain continued to offer strong support to Qatar and other nations’ arming and funding of “rebel” jihadist groups in Syria and Libya.

In 2017, when Qatar’s Gulf neighbors boycotted Doha, demanding that it stop funding terror, McCain wrote an op-ed in the New York Times urging the sides to settle their difference in the face of “more pressing threats,” such as Russia.

The McCain Institute has not only cozied up to Qatari front groups, but plenty of other dictatorial nations. The nonprofit outfit, like the Clinton Foundation, has been accused of acting as a crony pseudo-international humanitarian network that ends up empowering the world’s worst theocratic regimes. However, its particular affinity for the nation of Qatar has gone relatively unnoticed in the media.

In 2017, at the McCain Institute’s high-level Sedona Forum, “Meshal Bin Hamad Al-Thani, Qatar’s Ambassador to the U.S., was invited to mingle with the McCain Institute’s pre-selected guests,” the Daily Caller reported.

The McCain Institute frequently highlights its claimed efforts in combatting human trafficking. Given that it is such a high-priority item for the organization, its decision to partner with Qatari institutions may strike many as odd, because Qatar remains the equivalent of a modern slave state for non-Qatari workers in the country. Qatar’s usage of forced labor to build its World Cup sites has been described as a “human trafficking nightmare.”

Nonetheless, the McCain institute has been embedded with SIGA and other Qatar-linked groups since the beginning.

“The McCain Institute shares SIGA’s belief that a cohesive effort is needed to restore trust in the sports industry, and are therefore proud to be one of the organisation’s founding members,” reads a press release from the McCain Institute website, touting its partnership with the Qatar-created front in working to supposedly combat human trafficking, which as stated above, is a government-sanctioned epidemic in Qatar.

The McCain Institute claims to be transparent about its funding mechanisms. However, it shields some of its donors with anonymity, so it’s unclear whether Qatar-backed institutions donate directly to the organization. The McCain Institute does reveal that it has received “two anonymous donations in support of its efforts countering human trafficking.”

Cindy McCain and the McCain Institute have partnered with elements of the Qatari regime and offered its front groups the political legitimacy that it needs to expand its nefarious influence inside the United States, to the detriment of U.S. citizens and freedom-loving people throughout the world.

The McCain Institute did not respond to a request for comment. (For more from the author of “McCain Institute Cozies up to Qatar Front Groups” please click HERE)

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Man Arrested in Reported Sword Attack Over MAGA Hat Spat

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By AP. San Francisco police arrested a man they say slashed another man’s hand with a sword after the victim allegedly knocked a “Make America Great Again” hat off his head.

Police say 30-year-old Leor Bergland was arrested Wednesday night when officers spotted him in a restaurant.

Police say a 27-year-old Berkeley resident swatted Bergland’s baseball cap from his head Friday night when they encountered each other in a San Francisco neighborhood. Police say Bergland drew a sword and cut the victim’s left hand before fleeing. The victim and another man gave chase, but stopped when Bergland turned on them and brandished the sword. (Read more from “Man Arrested in Reported Sword Attack Over MAGA Hat Spat” HERE)

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Woman Harassed 74-Year-Old Man for Wearing MAGA Hat in Starbucks: ‘Get the F*** out of My Town’

By Yahoo. A California accountant’s attempt to shame an elderly Trump supporter backfired.

On Monday, Palo Alto local Rebecca Parker Mankey told her followers on Facebook that she reamed out a 74-year-old man, reportedly named Victor F., at Starbucks for wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat.

“Anybody in Palo Alto knows this freak,” Mankey wrote alongside photos of the man. “He was sitting in Starbucks. I think he lives in Palo Alto. He will never forget me and will think seriously about wearing that hat in my town ever again. If you see him in this hat, please confront him. You do not want to be the person who didn’t speak up as we slipped into fascism.”

She continued, “I yelled at him. Called the entire Starbucks to order and yelled at him more about how it is not ok to hate brown people. He threatened to call the cops. I left after yelling at him some more.”

After her lunch break, Mankey said she returned to Starbucks. “I went back in and yelled that I had changed my mind and wanted him to call the police because I wanted to know his name, where he lived, his wife’s name, and where his kids went to school,” she wrote.

(Read more from “Woman Harassed 74-Year-Old Man for Wearing MAGA Hat in Starbucks: ‘Get the F*** out of My Town'” HERE)

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Democrats Vote to Subpoena Mueller Report Over Republican Objections

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Democratic efforts to compel the release of the Mueller report to Congress from the Department of Justice ended as expected on Wednesday, but not without vocal pushback from Republicans.

A meeting of the House Judiciary Committee resulted in a party-line 24-17 vote to authorize a subpoena of special counsel Robert Mueller’s report of his investigation and all the underlying evidence from Attorney General William Barr.

“Why are we here?” asked Judiciary member and Oversight Committee ranking member Jim Jordan, R-Ohio. “Seems to me we’re here because the Mueller report wasn’t what the Democrats thought it was going to be.”

“In fact, it was just the opposite,” Jordan continued. “What’d the attorney general tell us that the principal findings of Mr. Mueller’s report were? No new indictments, no sealed indictments, no collusion, no obstruction.”

Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, also called out Democratic efforts to keep digging into the issue, despite the findings of the Mueller report.

“Enough is enough, for heaven’s sakes, let’s please move on,” Gohmert said, before turning his critiques directly to committee chairman Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y.

“There was a time when I loved and appreciated the current chairman’s desire to protect privacy rights; I saw that dramatically eroded during the Obama administration,” Gohmert continued. “But I am still hoping and praying that our now-chairman’s once great desire to protect privacy rights and to try to hold back the bounds of what Orwell described as happening now … it’s time to go back and clean up the mess that’s been made over years of abuse.”

The committee’s top Republican took issue with Democrats’ demand for underlying evidence, saying that Barr would have to violate federal law to comply with it.

“The subpoena for the Mueller report and its underlying evidence commands the attorney general to do what the unthinkable is,” said committee ranking member Doug Collins. “We’re going to ask the attorney general to break his regulations, to break the law.”

“The attorney general’s entire mandate is to enforce the law, and he’s expressly forbidden from providing grand jury [material] outside of the department, [with] very limited and narrow exceptions,” Collins added. “Congress is not one of the exceptions and the chairman knows it.”

A few weeks ago, the House of Representatives voted almost unanimously to make as much of the report public as possible, though a small handful of Republicans objected to the resolution by voting “present.”

Barr told congressional leaders last week that he plans to release what he can of the report and that he expects his department “will be in a position to release the report by mid-April, if not sooner.”

In his opening statement, Nadler said that he won’t issue the report right away, but will instead give Barr a chance to “change his mind” about whether to send a redacted or unredacted report to Congress.

(For more from the author of “Democrats Vote to Subpoena Mueller Report Over Republican Objections” please click HERE)

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Military Providing ‘Sex-Change’ Treatment for Thousands of Minor Dependents

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The number of military children receiving transgender-related care within the military health system increased significantly following a Defense Department policy change that gave them access to non-surgical treatment, according to a report published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics.

Between October 2009 and April 2017, 2,533 young people out of the roughly 1.7 million eligible for medical care through the military health system received transgender-associated care, increasing from 135 in all of 2010 to 528 in the first four months of 2017 alone.

In October 2016, the DoD began providing coverage to dependents and military retirees for mental health counseling and hormone therapy for gender dysphoria, the clinical diagnosis for those for whom identifying with their birth gender causes significant distress.

According to the study, the majority of youths seeking transgender treatment under the military health program were born female (65 percent) and the median associated age for gender-related treatment was 17 years old. But roughly a quarter of the children seeking gender-related care were younger than 14.

While the policy went into effect in late 2016, patients previously could seek treatment by requesting a waiver. Under the policy, military medical facilities and Tricare provide hormone treatment and counseling. Surgery is authorized only when deemed medically necessary, such as in cases of ambiguous genitalia. (Read more from “Military Providing ‘Sex-Change’ Treatment for Thousands of Minor Dependents” HERE)

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Homosexual Hook-Up App Grindr Labeled National Security Threat, Forced to Sell

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A Chinese gaming company has decided to sell the popular LGBTQ dating app Grindr LLC after a U.S. national security panel declared the app to be a threat to service members, Reuters first reported.

Beijing Kunlun Tech Co Ltd, which has owned the California-based dating app since 2016, decided to sever ties at the behest of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS, which pointed to major concerns over personal data of app users — notably military and intelligence personnel — being made publicly available. . .

The decision of CFIUS to intervene in Grindr’s business operations signals increasing doubt on the part of U.S. officials in the ability of Chinese businesses to keep sensitive information of Americans secret.

In recent years, the panel also blocked the sale of the money transfer company MoneyGram to Chinese business owners, the report said. (Read more from “Homosexual Hook-Up App Grindr Labeled National Security Threat, Forced to Sell” HERE)

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Collusion? Russians Gave $35 Million to Company With John Podesta on Board

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Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign manager, John Podesta, played a central role in another potential Russian collusion scandal that has not yet been investigated.

Podesta, the former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, served on the board of Joule Unlimited, a now defunct alternative energy company, from January 2011 to January 2014. He resigned from the company’s board to accept the powerful job of Counselor to President Barack Obama.

During Podesta’s tenure on the board of Joule Unlimited, a significant investment in the company by a firm owned by the Russian government escaped review and scrutiny by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS).

In September 2011, eight months after Podesta joined the board of Joule Unlimited, Rusnano, a venture capital fund wholly owned by the Russian government, announced it was investing one billion Russian rubles, $35 million, in the company, which accounted for 46 percent of the $75 million invested in it up to that time from its launch in 2007. Founders Afeyan Noubar and Dr. David Berry invested an estimated $10 million in the 2007 first round. The venture firm Noubar heads, Flagship Ventures – now known as Flagship Pioneering – led a second round investment of $30 million in 2010, as the Boston Globe reported.

Curiously, the CFIUS failed to initiate a review of the transaction despite statutory and administrative guidelines that any such transaction in which a foreign country or foreign company obtained more than a ten percent interest in an American company was reviewable. (Read more from “Collusion? Russians Gave $35 Million to Company With John Podesta on Board” HERE)

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Transgender McDonalds Employee Claims to Be Victim of Discrimination

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By Breitbart. A transgender McDonald’s employee filed a lawsuit against the company claiming to be a victim of repeated instances of discriminatory behavior by colleagues.

Joselyn Kelly, who was hired by McDonald’s this year to work as a supervisor overseeing multiple McDonald’s locations in Mississippi, claimed staffers acted in a discriminatory way after Kelly told McDonald’s franchise owners Elizabeth and Andrew Smith about being transgender, according to documents obtained by the Clarion-Ledger. . .

The suit claimed that Kelly was “forced to resign” over the traumatizing actions of the other employees. Kelly then filed a discrimination charge against the Smiths with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).

The EEOC then followed up with Kelly, informing the McDonald’s employee of the right to sue the company. Kelly subsequently filed the suit on March 29 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi. . .

Other transgender individuals have claimed discrimination against others for not using proper pronouns. A transgender woman shopping at a GameStop claimed to be a victim of hate after a male clerk used the pronoun “sir.” (Read more from “Transgender McDonalds Employee Claims to Be Victim of Discrimination” HERE)

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Man Sues McDonald’s, Alleges Discrimination Because ‘She’s’ Transgender

By Clarion Ledger. According to the suit, examples of the discrimination include:

Refusing to address her by her preferred pronoun, calling her “he” or “him” rather than “she or “her”;

Addressing her as “it” and using a slur;

Stating that “transgenders” were an abomination;

Mockingly calling her “Juwanna Man,” in reference to a male film character who impersonates a female;

(Read more from “Man Sues McDonald’s, Alleges Discrimination Because ‘She’s’ Transgender” HERE)

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Joe Biden Promises to NOT Manhandle Any More Women

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Former Vice President Joe Biden has heard the allegations lobbed against him. And he’s not sorry. He’s not letting alleged instances of being a bit too aggressive with some women hold his 2020 plans back. These aren’t allegations on par with creeps like Harvey Weinstein. Still, Biden’s overt affections, for lack of a better term, has landed him in hot water with four women who said they were more or less totally creeped out and uncomfortable with the shoulder touching, the hair sniffing, the kissing on the back of the head, and the hands being placed in the thigh region.

Yeah, say what you will, Democrats. This still could be construed as sexual harassment. And these are your rules; will you abide by them? Or will you play by the not-so-secret Democratic protocols that give political cover to your allies when they are accused of bad behavior? It could get nasty, but for now, Creepy Joe has released a video where he said that he wouldn’t manhandle women as much[.]

(Read more from “Joe Biden Promises to NOT Manhandle Any More Women” HERE)

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Major Upset: Conservative Supreme Court Candidate Shocks Liberals With Surprise Victory

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It was a statewide race that only the nerdiest of political nerds were following at the national level, but suffice it to say that we’d be hearing a lot about it if the expected outcome had come to pass. By way of background, Wisconsin’s Supreme Court has been decidedly conservative for years, but when a liberal justice won a resounding 12-point victory last fall (Badger State voters choose Supreme Court members in nominally “non-partisan” elections), the Left immediately set it sights on the 2019 contest. If a left-leaning candidate had defeated another right-leaning jurist — as was widely anticipated by political experts — liberals believed they’d have a very real shot at wresting ideological control of the state’s high court in 2020. But a funny thing happened on the way to that liberal judicial renaissance. Voters intervened:

Appeals Judge Brian Hagedorn held a narrow lead early Wednesday in the race for Wisconsin Supreme Court, according to unofficial tallies that were so close both sides were bracing for a recount. In an early morning tweet and statement to supporters, Hagedorn claimed victory. “The people of Wisconsin have spoken and our margin of victory is insurmountable,” the statement read…Hagedorn led fellow Appeals Judge Lisa Neubauer 50.2% to 49.8% with nearly all of Tuesday’s votes unofficially counted — at a margin that allows a recount. A win by Hagedorn would defy the predictions of prominent groups that typically back conservative judicial candidates but counted him out and wouldn’t spend on his behalf during the race.

Hagedorn, the conservative, was seen as such a long-shot underdog that some deep-pocketed conservative groups decided not to spend money in the race, resulting in a large disparity that favored the left-wing message machine. But a concerted push by grassroots activists, and an eleventh-hour blitz by former Governor Scott Walker, helped secure what appears to be a major upset. Conservative groups closed the race with an ad reminding voters of the Kavanaugh fight, while liberal organizations (like Eric Holder’s) tried to tie their opponent to President Trump. Also, you night think that Hillary Clinton’s 2016 loss would’ve helped Democrats internalize the lesson that, contra their own talking points and hilarious posturing, money does not necessarily “buy” elections. This outcome should reinforce that reality:

(Read more from “Major Upset: Conservative Supreme Court Candidate Shocks Liberals With Surprise Victory” HERE)

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