23 Dreamers from Obama Amnesty Snared in Criminal Dragnet

deportationBy Stephen Dinan. Nearly two dozen of the illegal immigrants picked up in a nationwide sweep for criminal aliens earlier this month had previously been approved for President Obama’s deportation amnesty, the Homeland Security Department said Wednesday.

All 23 were part of Mr. Obama’s original program for so-called Dreamers, which began in 2012 and which had granted tentative legal legal status to nearly 640,000 as of the end of last year.

Of the 23, 15 were still actively part of the amnesty, while eight had been approved once but had not gotten their status renewed after the first two-year period expired.

The department is trying to deport all of them now.

The Dreamers were snared as part of Operation Cross Check, which saw U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents go after top-priority targets for deportation in a move the administration said proved that they were still trying to deport dangerous illegal immigrants, even as Mr. Obama moves ahead with his amnesty. (Read more from “23 Dreamers from Obama Amnesty Snared in Criminal Dragnet” HERE)

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Texas Judge Threatens Justice Department over Obama’s Immigration Plan

By David Zucchino. A federal judge threatened Thursday to sanction the U.S. Department of Justice if he finds that government lawyers misled him about the rollout of President Obama’s plan to shield up to five million people from the threat of deportation.

U.S. District Judge Andrew S. Hanen, visibly annoyed, confronted a U.S. deputy assistant attorney general over previous government assurances on the timing of the program.


He asked why he shouldn’t grant a discovery request for internal federal immigration documents, a request filed Thursday by 26 states that are suing over Obama’s executive actions on immigration.

Hanen ordered a freeze on the Obama plan on Feb. 16 in response to the lawsuit, which accuses the administration of overstepping the president’s executive authority.

At a one-hour hearing in Brownsville, Hanen gave the Department of Justice 48 hours to file a motion in response. He said he would then rule promptly on whether to require the government to produce immigration documents concerning applications under Obama’s deferred action program. (Read more from “Texas Judge Threatens Justice Department over Obama’s Immigration Plan” HERE)

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Coma Victim Comes Back to Life After Hearing Doctors Ask Her Husband the Unthinkable

coma victimA mother has described how she heard a doctor asking her husband about switching off her life-support as she lay in a medically-induced coma after collapsing from a rare condition.

Jenny Bone, who was feared to have catastrophic brain damage after going into cardiac arrest, lay listening to the life-or-death conversation but was paralysed and unable to intervene.

She recalls her husband John ruling out ending her life – despite a previous conversation when she said she wanted to die if incapacitated permanently. The 40-year-old later recovered and now says she is relieved he went against her wishes.

‘I was aware of conversations around me,’ she said. ‘The most frequent one was being turned in the bed. A familiar “ready, steady, turn” would come from the nurses.

‘The most alarming was between a doctor and my husband enquiring as to my wishes surrounding being kept alive on a ventilator and that they were unsure whether my mental ability had been impaired due to lack of oxygen while they were attempting to restart my heart. (Read more from “Coma Victim Comes Back to Life After Hearing Doctors Ask Her Husband the Unthinkable” HERE)

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Watch: Pro-Hillary Ad That Exploits Little Girls Sparks Social Media Backlash; ‘An Embarrassment for the Left’

hclintonnTwisted new political ads in support of Hillary Clinton confirm that world truly is – upside down.

Luke Montgomery is the “brains” behind the political ads that were released Wednesday. He’s also the same opportunist who made a 2014 viral video of little girls dropping F-bomb’s.

This time, he exploited little girls to promote Hillary Clinton and urge people to sign a petition to support her if she decides to run for president . . .

The little feminists in training run through the streets wearing patriotic colors and demonstrate for the camera the clear indoctrination and misinformation that’s been drilled into their heads.

It all adds up, as one Twitter user puts it, to “an embarrassment for the left” (if they were capable of it). (Read more from “Watch: Pro-Hillary Ad That Exploits Little Girls Sparks Social Media Backlash; ‘An Embarrassment for the Left'” HERE)

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After Terminator Arm, DARPA Now Wants Implantable Hard Drive for the Brain [+video]

TerminatorAn experimental Pentagon program has already developed two types of a highly advanced, Terminator-like prosthetic arm.

What’s more, a quadriplegic woman with sensors implanted onto her brain controlled one of the robotic limbs to grab a cup, shake hands and eat a chocolate bar. She even flew an F-35 Joint Strike Fighter simulator using just her thoughts.

Now, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) wants to expand on that cutting-edge work to build other potential breakthrough medical technologies, including a pacemaker-sized device that might someday improve the memory of troops who suffered a traumatic brain injury. Think of it as a hard drive of sorts for the brain.

“We know we need a next-generation device that doesn’t exist today,” said Justin Sanchez, a program manager in DARPA’s Biological Technologies Office in Arlington, Virginia. “That’s what these new programs are all about — not only understanding the brain and these conditions, but building the hardware that enables us to address those issues. You need both. (Read more from “After Terminator Arm, DARPA Wants Implantable Hard Drive for the Brain [+video]” HERE)

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ISIS Claims Responsibility for Tunisia Museum Attack, Massacre

Gun MenISIS apparently claimed responsibility Thursday for the deadly terrorist attack at a landmark museum in the heart of that country’s capital, a mass shooting that has shaken the birthplace of the Arab Spring and stirred questions about militants in the country.

In an audio statement posted online Thursday, ISIS identified two men — Abu Zakariya al-Tunisi and Abu Anas al-Tunisi — it said used “automatic weapons and hand grenades” to kill and injure what it called “crusaders and apostates” in the Bardo Museum in Tunis. Tunisian Health Minister Said Aidi said 23 people are believed to have been killed, including at least one who died at a hospital overnight.

And that bloodshed, the ISIS message warned, is “just the start” . . .

A U.S. official told CNN there is no reason to doubt the claim’s authenticity. That said, American officials are checking the platform that the statement went out on, including the extent to which it’s tied to the group calling itself the Islamic State.

The current U.S. thinking is the attack may have been carried out by local “franchise” adherents to ISIS, rather than centrally directed by the Islamist extremist group’s leadership, which is now thought to be in Syria. (Read more from “ISIS Apparently Claims Responsibility for Tunisia Museum Attack” HERE)

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New Dashboard Tracks Which Federal Sites You Visit, and How You Got There

federal siteBy Nextgov. At 11:23 a.m. on Thursday, 150,980 people — more than the population of Alexandria, Virginia — were browsing U.S. federal websites. Five thousand of them visited an IRS.gov page called “Where’s my Refund?” Another 2,091 were checking forecasts on Weather.gov.

These stats come from a new dashboard tracking user behavior on federal websites — what they’re looking at, what device they use, as well as their browser and operating system. The White House’s U.S. Digital Service, along with two General Services Administration’s tech teams, 18F and the Digital Analytics Program, launched the site Thursday.

Created over the course of two to three weeks, the site debuted during Sunshine Week, a national effort dedicated to government transparency.

The data could help federal digital service teams focus on the “services that matter most to the American people” by helping government agencies “understand how people find, access and use government services online,” a White House blog post announcing the site said. (Read more from “New Dashboard Tracks Which Federal Sites You Visit, and How You Got There” HERE)


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ACLU Sues for Airport ‘Behavior Detection’ Program Records


By My FoxNy. A civil rights group is trying to force the federal government to turn over information about airport “behavior detection” programs designed to spot passengers who are potential threats.

A Freedom of Information Act lawsuit was filed Thursday in federal court in New York City.

The American Civil Liberties Union says the government has been slow to respond to its request to learn more about behavior detection programs that have been used nationwide since 2003. (Read more from this story HERE)

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After Embarrassing Wait, Obama Congratulates Netanyahu on Election Victory

Photo Credit: Times of Israel

Photo Credit: Times of Israel

US President Barack Obama on Thursday called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to congratulate him on his recent election win, after a campaign that seemed to sour relations between the two allies.

Obama spoke to the Israeli leader “to congratulate him on his party’s success in winning a plurality of Knesset seats,” the National Security Council said in a statement.

According to the White House, Obama “emphasized the importance the United States places on our close military, intelligence, and security cooperation with Israel, which reflects the deep and abiding partnership between both countries.”

The two leaders “agreed to continue consultations on a range of regional issues, including the difficult path forward to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict” . . .

Earlier, spokespeople in the White House and State Department indicated the US would re-evaluate its approach to the peace process and its support for Israel in the United Nations in the wake of Netanyahu’s comments. (Read more from “After Wait, Obama Congratulates Netanyahu on Election Victory” HERE)

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Rand Paul 2016 Announcement Date: Senator Eyeing April 7 To Launch Presidential Campaign

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul is expected to announce plans to join the party’s 2016 presidential field on April 7, multiple sources inside Paul’s camp told MSNBC on Tuesday. The announcement, scheduled to take place in Louisville, Kentucky, will serve as the official campaign launch for Paul, who has spent months traveling to early voting states to assess whether his largely libertarian message will catch fire with the party’s conservative base.

“This will be an official announcement, not an exploratory committee,” said a source close to Paul who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss his plans. “Everything will happen pretty quickly over the next couple of weeks,” another source close to Paul told msnbc.

Doug Stafford, executive director at RandPAC, Paul’s political action committee, had no comment.

Paul is set to travel to the four major early voting states immediately after the announcement, aides said. He will host events in Milford, New Hampshire, April 8; Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina on April 9; Iowa City, Iowa on April 10; and Las Vegas, Nevada on April 11.

Paul, a 52-year old ophthalmologist, is the son of Ron Paul, the well-known Texas libertarian congressman who sought the presidency three times, in 1988, 2008 and 2012. The younger Paul has worked to reassemble his father’s passionate supporter base while also extending his reach into more traditional Republican audiences. Rand Paul has also courted voters not traditionally allied with the GOP, including young people and African-Americans. He recently joined Democrats including Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Cory Booker of New Jersey to introduce legislation loosening federal restrictions on the use of medicinal marijuana. (Read more from “Rand Paul 2016 Announcement Date: Senator Eyeing April 7 To Launch Presidential Campaign” HERE)

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Tom Cotton Calls for ‘Global Military Dominance’ in Maiden Senate Speech [+video]

Over the course of just a few days last week, Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) went from relatively anonymous freshman senator to what seemed like the tip of every tongue in Washington — thanks to the letter he wrote and got 46 fellow Republicans to join, warning the ruling Iranian regime to be wary of negotiating a nuclear deal with President Obama.

But here’s a fun fact: Cotton made his big splash before even giving his first speech on the Senate floor.

That occasion came late Monday, when Cotton delivered his “maiden speech,” which is typically given after a period of silence and as a statement of principles or objectives rather than a comment on the partisan issue of the day.

Cotton’s address has gotten a lot less attention than his Iran letter, and that is not surprising: Where the letter was terse and seemingly calculated to influence the multiparty nuclear negotiations now underway, the half-hour speech was dense, rich in historical references, and calibrated to further establish Cotton as the Republican Party’s young leading light on foreign affairs and defense — positioning him to assume the mantle now worn by elders like John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.).

“An alarm should be sounding in our ears,” Cotton said. “Our enemies, sensing weakness and hence opportunity, have become steadily more aggressive. Our allies, uncertain of our commitment and capability, have begun to conclude that they must look out for themselves, even where it is unhelpful to stability and order. Our military, suffering from years of neglect, has seen its relative strength decline to historic levels.” (Read more from “Tom Cotton Calls for ‘Global Military Dominance’ in Maiden Senate Speech [+video]” HERE)

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Obama: If I Could Do It Again, ‘I Think I Would Have Closed Guantanamo on the First Day’ [+video]

President Barack Obama slammed Republicans’ latest budget proposals on Wednesday, saying funding for research, education and infrastructure would be better for economic growth than tax cuts.

In a speech at the City Club of Cleveland, Obama mocked Republicans for turning to tax cuts in a budget that “doubles down on trickle-down” economics..

“Republicans in Congress have put forward the same proposals year after year after year regardless of the realities of the economy,” Obama said. “When the economy’s in a slump? We needed tax cuts. When the economy’s doing well? You know what – let’s try some tax cuts,” he said.

In another issue that has divided Washington, Obama said he wished he had closed the U.S. prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, on his first day in office. His efforts to close the controversial facility have since been thwarted largely because of Republican opposition.

Obama said the budget plan put forward this week by Republicans in the House of Representatives would cut funding to centers that help manufacturing, a sector critical to the economy of northeast Ohio, home to plants owned by Ford, GM, Goodyear and Sherwin-Williams Co. (Read more from “Obama: If I Could Do It Again, ‘I Think I Would Have Closed Guantanamo on the First Day’ [+video]” HERE)

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