Think the First Amendment Protects Books and Movies? Government Officials Don’t Agree

/0 Comments/in , /by

Books, movies, satellite radio shows, and streaming video about real-life politics aren’t protected by the First Amendment’s guarantee of a free press, some government officials argue.

The Federal Election Commission hasn’t proposed banning books or movies, but in a 3-3 vote last month along party lines, the six-member panel left the regulatory option on the table.

It was just one of numerous ties. But FEC member Lee Goodman, a Republican, says he’s surprised cases that deal with regulating content from a book publisher or news programming would result in split votes.

The FEC hasn’t spoken in a unanimous voice about what Goodman and others say are basic matters of free speech under the First Amendment. Rather, various commission votes open the door to applying campaign finance laws to movies, books, and other media rarely ever considered before as campaign contributions.

In the past two years, the FEC, divided equally into Democrat and Republican factions, investigated books containing partisan material (among them a book by House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis.), a conspiratorial film disparaging President Barack Obama, and a Republican presidential debate on Fox News Channel.

While the presidentially appointed commission sanctioned neither Ryan’s publisher nor Fox News, it avoided granting the “press exemption” to either.

The exemption was designed to ensure that news organizations, which generally are corporations, cannot be accused of electioneering or making in-kind campaign contributions based on news reporting or commentary on political candidates. The law states, in part:

(B) The term ‘expenditure’ does not include—
(i) any news story, commentary, or editorial distributed through the facilities of any broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine, or other periodical publication, unless such facilities are owned or controlled by any political party, political committee, or candidate; …

In one case, FEC member Ellen Weintraub, a Democrat, suggested the “press exemption,” provided in campaign finance law, doesn’t protect book publishers.

The commission was preparing to vote on a routine “tech modernization” proposal, regarding rules about financial contributions made electronically. Goodman proposed an amendment to clarify that the “press exemption” includes books, movies, satellite radio, and streaming services—effectively ensuring them the same First Amendment protections that newspapers, radio, and TV networks currently enjoy.

“I don’t have the confidence that four commissioners or even three commissioners will recognize the press rights, but will rather trim the sails,” Goodman told The Daily Signal in a phone interview.

Goodman said he worries about a chilling effect—and that it ought to be a bipartisan concern.

“The commission’s respect for the free press shouldn’t vary based on who is on the commission or on the content of the publication,” he said.

‘Nearly Impossible’

Weintraub pointed out that Goodman proposed an amendment to a measure that had nothing to do with free speech.

In an email, Weintraub told The Daily Signal:

The matter before the commission that day was a proposal to make minor technological modernizations to the commission’s regulations, updating them to avoid specifying such outmoded technology as faxes and microfilm, for example. At the meeting, Commissioner Goodman attempted to add a nongermane amendment to the proposal.

The First Amendment contains protections that are critical to free speech, a free press, and a free country. It needs no implementing regulations from the FEC.

Weintraub then referred to the Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling, in the 2010 case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, that organizations have free speech rights allowing them to spend money to support or oppose political candidates.

The work we do need to do, which some of my colleagues, including Commissioner Goodman, have blocked for years, is to write rules that respond to Citizens United and the advent of super PACs. Sadly, even routine regulatory fixes have become nearly impossible to accomplish at the FEC.

This useful and almost entirely noncontroversial technological-modernization proposal has been bogged down for years. I decided to stick with the staff’s draft in the hope of getting this done without further delaying it with nongermane but substantive proposals.

Besides Goodman, FEC Chairman Matthew S. Petersen and member Caroline Hunter also are Republicans. Weintraub and Ann Ravel are Democrats, and Vice Chairman Steven Walther is an independent who caucuses with them.

‘We Are Constrained’

In the past, the FEC frequently would vote 6-0 in many cases that dealt with the First Amendment, giving the benefit of the doubt to media. Among them was a 2002 rejection of a complaint regarding two news organizations that sponsored a candidate debate. That consensus seems to have gone away, Goodman argues.

“Anyone who studies a series of cases on books and films must come to the conclusion there is a distinct difference of opinion on the definition of the press exemption,” Goodman said. “It’s not just on film, but on press in general.”

In 2014, the FEC ruled on a complaint about Ryan’s book, “The Way Forward: Renewing the American Idea,” published before Ryan became House speaker in October 2015.

The three Republican commission members said they wanted the decision to clearly state that book publishers are exempt from campaign finance regulations, the same as news media. The Democrats disagreed.

Ultimately, the commission approved a more limited exemption to determine the book didn’t violate campaign finance laws. Still, this marked an occasion on which the FEC refused to rule out regulating books based on political content.

Goodman points to Weintraub’s words regarding this issue as reason for concern. During the commission meeting, the Democrat said:

Books don’t appear to be covered by the media exemption. What we call the media exemption, oddly enough, doesn’t use the word ‘media’ and doesn’t use the word ‘press.’ … I don’t know why Congress wrote the word ‘periodical publication’ in there but they did and we are constrained in interpreting that particular provision … and the words that it uses.

When a group called Highway 61 Entertainment released the film “Dreams From My Real Father,” purporting that Obama’s real father was a communist, someone filed a complaint after the filmmaker mailed millions of copies to voters in swing states during the 2012 presidential race.

Again, Republican members determined the film was covered by the media exemption and Democrats determined it was not. This led to a 3-3 tie vote in April.

‘Extremely Dangerous’

Seeking to narrowly define media protected by the First Amendment could be a means of targeting alternative conservative media, said Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation and former FEC member.

“FEC Democrats don’t want an extended media exemption to include conservative websites,” von Spakovsky told The Daily Signal.

Given the 4-4 split on the Supreme Court, one FEC ruling could set up litigation to work its way through the courts, he said.

“It’s extremely dangerous. Four liberals on the court now that want to overturn Citizens United, and you have a 4-4 split,” von Spakovsky said.

Conversely, The New York Times, in an editorial last month, called the FEC an “impotent joke” and said it is “paralyzed and should be replaced by a new agency.”

Interestingly enough, the commission’s questions even surrounded whether a news organization, Fox News, could be regulated.

Mark Everson, a largely unknown candidate who ran for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, filed an FEC complaint after he was excluded from both the cable news channel’s main debate event featuring 10 candidates and the “undercard” debate featuring seven other candidates. He did not reach the polling threshold.

Everson’s complaint focused on how Fox made a change to the second debate that accommodated more candidates but still left him out. These were the opening debates of the campaign season, held Aug. 6, 2015, in Cleveland.

In June, the FEC considered several motions on the Fox News case, none of which gained the needed four votes, so no action was taken. But in two key motions, Democrat Ravel and independent Walther each voted that Fox had violated campaign finance law.

‘More Robust Scrutiny’

The next motion, which failed 3-3, was to find no wrongdoing by Fox in the debate format because the news operation was protected under the press exemption.

Weintraub, Ravel, and Walther voted against applying the exemption to Fox. Goodman voted with the other two Republicans, Peterson and Hunter, for applying the exemption.

Here’s how Ravel explained her vote against Fox to The Washington Post:

There have to be pre-established, objective criteria. Changing the standards in the last moment [as Fox did] was the subject of a complaint to the commission and we responded to it in our view, in a nonpartisan way, in a way that was consistent with the clear law, so my role in the commission is not to apply constitutional principles because I’m not on the Supreme Court. If I were, I’d be happy to do so. We’re a regulatory agency and our role is to follow the law and apply the law.

In the FEC’s statement on the Fox News case, Goodman urged a more thorough conversation about news media protections. He wrote:

Given the [FEC] Office of General Counsel’s recommendation and our colleagues’ votes in this matter, this compromise is no longer tenable. The commission’s debate regulation cannot be used to impose government restrictions on newsroom decisions and to punish, and even censor, American press organizations. We can no longer agree to avoid addressing freedom of the press. As we have been warning in matter after matter, our colleagues’ desire to use this agency’s authority to regulate and punish the press and media warrants more robust scrutiny and a civil public debate.

(For more from the author of “Think the First Amendment Protects Books and Movies? Government Officials Don’t Agree” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Within a Generation, Our National Debt Will Cost the Typical Family $12,000

/0 Comments/in , /by

When confronted in the final presidential debate with the assertion that each of their plans would increase the national debt, the candidates denied it by saying either economic growth or higher taxes would offset this increase.

But deficit spending and unsustainable debt pose a significant threat to our economy. The House Budget Committee recognizes this threat, recently releasing a working paper highlighting the damaging economic effects of the national debt. The results are scary.

As the government runs increasing budget deficits, it must borrow more money to fund current commitments, such as entitlements, and make interest payments on the debt. This makes interest rates a larger share of the federal budget and in turn increases borrowing by the government.

Academic research shows that high national debt is associated with less economic output and less prosperity for individuals and families.

The Congressional Budget Office’s projections reflect this. Compared to a future where the government adopted reforms that stabilized debt at the current level of 75 percent of gross domestic product, the current path of growing spending and debt results in an annual income loss of about $12,000 for the average family by 2046.

We already are seeing the debt, approaching $20 trillion, drag down the economy. The recovery from the 2009 recession is the weakest in the modern era. Over the past five years, real GDP growth has averaged slightly more than 2 percent, below the historical average of 3 percent.

Even though the unemployment rate of 5 percent seems to indicate a healthy economy, a closer look at the numbers shows a different picture.

According to the House Budget Committee report, the number of individuals working part time due to poor economic conditions since the recession has jumped by 42 percent, and about 14 million Americans have left the labor force since early 2009.

Congress and the new president must begin to take our deficit spending and growing debt seriously.

Lawmakers should not raise taxes to try to solve the government’s fiscal problems. Our debt and deficits are the result of a spending problem, not a revenue problem.

Paul Winfree, director of the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation, writes that “revenue growth cannot keep up with spending if spending increases at a rate faster than the economy is growing in the long run.”

This is exactly the scenario we’re witnessing, given current projections.

Raising taxes would weaken the economy further and worsen the fiscal trajectory. The United States already has the highest corporate tax rate in the industrialized world; raising taxes higher would discourage investment and job creation.

Instead, lawmakers should focus on reforming the drivers of our national debt: entitlements. Medicare, Medicaid, other health care programs, and Social Security together made up 52 percent of the budget in 2015.

The Heritage Foundation’s “Blueprint for Balance” and “Blueprint for Reform” lay out a detailed plan to reform entitlements and control spending to balance the budget and reduce the debt.

America needs presidential leadership to control spending and debt and return to a balanced budget. (For more from the author of “Within a Generation, Our National Debt Will Cost the Typical Family $12,000” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Fact-Checking 7 Claims in the President’s Speech on Obamacare

/0 Comments/in , /by

In a speech before Miami Dade College students in Miami, Florida, on Thursday, President Barack Obama spoke about some of the successes of the Affordable Care Act, as well as what he would like to see for the future of his signature health care law.

The president’s address came just weeks before the 2017 open enrollment period, which starts Nov. 1, and at a time when much of the news surrounding the health care law has focused on increasing premiums and decreasing options for consumers buying coverage on Obamacare’s exchanges.

During his speech, the president touted the uninsured rate, which is at its lowest in history, but also conceded that improvements can be made to the law.

The president called for the creation of a public option, or government-run plan that competes with private insurers, which he mentioned in the Journal of the American Medical Association in June.

“The Affordable Care Act has done what it was designed to do,” Obama said. “It gave us affordable health care.”

In the years since Obamacare’s implementation, GOP lawmakers have voted to repeal the health care law more than 60 times. Obama, referencing those attempts, called on Republicans to abandon those efforts and instead work with the next president to fix the law.

“Repeal is not the answer,” he said.

While the president outlined many of Obamacare’s accomplishments, The Daily Signal provided more context for some of Obama’s claims about the health care law.

1.) “Because of this law, because of Obamacare, another 20 million Americans know the financial security of health insurance.”

Though the uninsured rate has reached a historic low and 20 million Americans now have health insurance, the majority of those who enrolled in coverage under Obamacare qualified for Medicaid. The Affordable Care Act loosened the guidelines for Medicaid eligibility, and since the law was passed in 2009, 31 states and the District of Columbia have expanded the program.

In 2014, for example, 9.25 million consumers enrolled in coverage on the federal and state-run exchanges. However, 97 percent of those new enrollees, or 8.99 million people, enrolled in Medicaid.

Under Medicaid expansion, people making up to 138 percent of the federal poverty line, or about $16,390 for an individual, qualified for Medicaid.

2.) “States like Louisiana that just expanded Medicaid—you had a Republican governor replaced by a Democratic governor. He said, ‘I want that money.’ [He] expanded Medicaid and found not only does it insure more people, but it’s actually saved the state big money and makes people less dependent on expensive emergency room care.”

Despite the president’s claim, recent findings from a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that expanding Medicaid won’t stop patients from using emergency rooms for primary care.

The study, published Wednesday, examined patients in Oregon who were enrolled in Medicaid in 2008. Oregon expanded its Medicaid system that year for enrollees selected through a lottery system.

According to the study, visits to the emergency room remained high two years after those selected for the lottery were enrolled in Medicaid.

The study was first published in 2014, and that year, researchers found that those who enrolled in Medicaid through the state’s lottery increased emergency room visits by 40 percent over the first 15 months of enrollment.

With two more years of data between the 2014 and 2016 studies, researchers said Wednesday there was no sign of emergency room use dropping.

3.) “For most Americans, the Affordable Care Act, [Obamacare], has not affected your coverage except to make it stronger.”

Though the majority of Americans receive their health insurance coverage through their employers, consumers purchasing plans both on and off the exchange have seen their narrower networks, canceled policies, and increased deductibles and premiums.

Insurance companies have pointed to enrollees who are sicker and more expensive as one of the primary reasons for increased premiums. Additionally, health policy experts have said that insurers have been forced to narrow networks as a way to control premium increases.

4.) “Because the federal government pays for almost all of [Medicaid] expansion, you can’t use as an excuse that well, the state can’t afford it. Because the federal government is paying it.”

The federal government covered the cost of Medicaid expansion to states for its first three years, 2014 to 2017. During his speech, the president said the health care law provided states with an incentive to expand Medicaid at no cost to its taxpayers.

However, an August report from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Office of the Actuary found that the cost of Medicaid expansion for 2015 was $6,366 per person—49 percent higher than past estimates.

In its report, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said it expected the costs of expansion per person to decrease, but instead, costs increased.

Additionally, a 2015 report from the Foundation for Government Accountability, a Florida-based think tank, found that Medicaid expansion in Ohio ran $1.5 billion over budget during the program’s first 18 months. Budget officials in Kentucky estimated Medicaid expansion there would cost $1.8 billion more than expected during 2014 and 2015.

5.) “Most people today can find a plan for less than $75 a month at the HealthCare.gov marketplace when you include the tax credits that the government is giving you.”

Earlier this month, Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell said that consumers who purchase plans on the exchange and receive a subsidy may see monthly premiums of less than $75. The president echoed Burwell’s statement Thursday.

However, of the 17.3 million people who purchase plans sold in the individual market in 2015, 7.3 million received subsidies that lowered the cost of their health insurance. Another 10 million consumers did not qualify for financial assistance.

Those consumers, experts say, are going to be hit the hardest by premium increases. In Missouri, for example, one Kansas City resident will see his monthly premiums rise to $716 each month.

Additionally, an analysis from Standard & Poor’s found that enrollment in Obamacare’s exchanges is likely to decrease next year as consumers who don’t qualify for subsidies leave them. Roughly 85 percent of consumers on the exchange are eligible for financial assistance, but the rest won’t be shielded from premium increases.

6.) “The second issue has to do with the marketplaces. Although the marketplaces are working well in most of the states, there are some states where there’s still not enough competition between insurers.”

After Obamacare was passed in 2009, states were encouraged to build their own exchanges. Those that did not would be permitted to use the federal exchange, HealthCare.gov.

As of 2016, 13 states had their own marketplaces, while another 27 used the federal exchange. Another seven had state-partnership marketplaces, and four had federally supported marketplaces, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Earlier this month, the federal government approved Kentucky’s request to switch from its own exchange, Kynect, to the federal exchange for the 2017 open enrollment period.

Last year, Oregon officials dissolved its state-run exchange, Cover Oregon.

Technical issues haven’t been the only problems with the exchanges, as insurers large and small have decided to pull out of them after losing money.

In five states, consumers who purchase coverage on the exchanges will have just one insurer to choose from. And in Tennessee, Insurance Commissioner Julie Mix McPeak warned in August, its exchange was “very near collapse.”

McPeak said she had to approve significant rate increases in the state in order to ensure consumers in Tennessee had options when purchasing coverage on the exchange.

Choice and competition among insurers has decreased not only as insurers have left the exchanges, but as the nonprofit consumer operated and oriented plans, or co-ops, have failed.

The health care law approved the creation of 23 co-ops, which were designed to provide consumers with more choice. However, in three years, 17 co-ops have collapsed.

7.) “In some states, the premium increases are manageable, 2 percent or 8 percent, some 20 percent. But we know there’s some states that may see premiums go up by 50 percent or more.”

Insurance commissioners have been mulling over insurers’ proposals for rates in 2017 over the last few months, with approved rates beginning to trickle out.

In at least eight states—Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee—premiums will rise by an average of 30 percent.

Additionally, the cost of premiums for plans sold on the individual market will increase by an average of 25 percent.

Consumers in just one state so far, Vermont, will see premium increases below 10 percent. There, insurance rates will rise by an average of 5.5 percent. (For more from the author of “Fact-Checking 7 Claims in the President’s Speech on Obamacare” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

10 Outrageous Clintonian Things Exposed by Wikileaks

/0 Comments/in , , /by

Recently, WikiLeaks has released over 17,000 emails from Clinton Campaign Chairman and Obama advisor John Podesta’s email account. Like most email accounts, a lot of what has been released is SPAM. Yes, the Clinton campaign manager gets an annoying amount of political fundraising emails, just like you. However, hidden beneath the sheer volume of the emails are several that depict what many Americans have suspected all along: The Clinton campaign is corrupt. Be it collusion with the media on carefully crafting stories, hiding her real position in secret, or trying to smear other candidates, these emails break the façade of the Clinton campaign.

1. Hillary wants open borders

Hillary’s staff went through her paid speeches to highlight potential problems if they were ever released. In one of her speeches to Banco Itau — a Brazilian bank — she spoke of her dream for a European Union-style open market complete with open borders for the Western Hemisphere.

Hillary Clinton Said Her Dream Is A Hemispheric Common Market, With Open Trade And Open Markets. *“My dream is a hemispheric common market, with open trade and open borders, some time in the future with energy that is as green and sustainable as we can get it, powering growth and opportunity for every person in the hemisphere.” [05162013 Remarks to Banco Itau.doc, p. 28]

2. Podesta agreed the Iran deal was Neville Chamberlain-esque

On July 15, 2015 BuzzFeed’s Andrew Kaczynski reported that Illinois senator Mark Kirk said, “This agreement condemns the next generation to cleaning up a nuclear > war in the Persian Gulf… This is the greatest appeasement since Chamberlain > gave Czechoslovakia to Hitler.”

The statement was emailed to John Podesta to which he replied simply, “Yup.”

This flies smack in the face of what Clinton has been saying on the campaign trail and in debates. When Donald Trump says the deal was bad, Clinton responds that it got rid of Iran’s nuclear program without firing a shot. Her senior staff seems to know how bad it really is.

3. Sanders was enticed to support Hillary

The Libertarian Republic showed, through WikiLeaks emails, that the Sanders campaign was manipulated to support Hillary Clinton.

In other words, Budowsky suggested the HRC campaign and the DNC ingratiate Bernie and his supporters by speaking and writing positively about him until the right time… Then get him to back Clinton officially so the game can go according to plan. Or at least, that is what is being alleged by those who have read the email.

Libertarian Party chair Nicholas Sarwark called it a “double-cross” on his official Twitter upon reading it …

4. Team Hillary created false Trump job postings on Craigslist

Team Hillary took time out of its busy schedule to troll Donald Trump on Craisglist. They posted fake job openings. Here’s one.

The boss has very strict standards for female employees…

Job requirements:

No gaining weight on the job

Must be open to public humiliation

A willingness to evaluate other women’s hotness

Proficient in lying about age if the boss thinks you’re too old

Working mothers not preferred (the boss finds pumping breast milk disgusting, and worries they’re too focused on their children).

Like it or not, [the boss] may greet you with a kiss on the lips or grope you under the meeting table.

5. Team Hillary believed Obama committed voter fraud in Colorado

This is one of the most amazing. Yesterday, Barack Obama got on stage and chided Trump for saying the election was rigged because of voter fraud. This is despite knowing, due to an earlier WikiLeaks dump, that the Hillary campaign thought he rigged the Colorado primary process in 2008. Here’s what Podesta wrote via email:

High importance. I met with Jim and Mike in Denver. They are both old friends of the Clintons and have lots of experience. Mike hosted our Boulder Road Show event. They are reliving the 08 caucuses where they believe the Obama forces flooded the caucuses with ineligible voters. They want to organize lawyers for caucus protection, election protection and to raise hard $. They are not just Colorado focused and have good contacts in the region

Mike is likely to talk to WJC about this in the near future. Marlon and Brynne, can you respond to the org chart request and give them some points of contact. Marc can you reach out to them on the lawyer election protection issues. Thanks.

6. Clinton staffer’s wished the San Bernardino jihadis were white

In December of 2015, Sayed Farouk and his wife committed an act of jihad in San Bernardino, California. John Podesta lamented that the name sounded too foreign and — gasp! — even Islamic. Here’s what Podesta wrote.

Better if a guy named Sayeed Farouk was reporting that a guy named Christopher Hayes was the shooter.

That’s right, as Crowder says in the video, conservatives joke about that being the response of liberals. But it ACTUALLY IS!

7. & 8. Media collusion

Crowder wraps together two points into one. The Clinton campaign brags about colluding with the media. Especially with Ezra Klein at Vox. The Clinton campaign sees Klein as the person it can count on to tell its side of the truth. When pressed about who the campaign could use to hold a “journalist accountable,” top Clinton staffer Jennifer Palmieri wrote:

I think that person, the degree to which they exist, is Ezra Klein. And we can do it with him today.

True to form, Klein’s Vox has been a large pushback against the WikiLeaks email dumps.

9. Clinton knowingly deleted email

Her staff was perplexed at Clinton’s use of private email and that she deleted emails she should have kept. Here’s that exchange:

Ok, one thing to use personal email, but why the “twisted truth” on why – with the two problematic areas being (a) emails to bill (when they were to bill’s staff) and (b) i only used one device — [Blackberry], when 2 weeks earlier, it was an iphone, BB and ipad. As Ann and I discussed, hopefully that’s a timing issue and whilst in state, she only used one. 🙂

I know when I talk to my friends who are attorneys we are all struggling with what happened to the emails and aren’t satisfied with answers to date. While we all know pf the occasional use of personal email addresses for business, none of my friends circle can understand how it was viewed as ok/secure/appropriate to use a private server for secure documents AND why further Hillary took it upon herself to review them and delete documents without providing anyone outside her circle a chance to weigh in.

It smacks of acting above the law and it smacks of the type of thing I’ve either gotten discovery sanctions for, fired people for, etc.

10. Obama and Clinton communicated via her private server and colluded to hide that fact

Andrew McCarthy at National Review has an in depth rundown of the fact that Clinton and Obama emailed each other using her private server. A fact that her team tried to hide.

We now know that Podesta was very concerned about the Obama-Clinton e-mails and turned to Mills for advice. His succinct e-mail to Mills is dated March 4, 2015 (at 8:41 p.m.), and he entitled it “Special Category.” He stated:

Think we should hold emails to and from potus? That’s the heart of his exec privilege. We could get them to ask for that. They may not care, but I [sic] seems like they will.

Plainly, Podesta was suggesting to Mills that the Obama-Clinton e-mails were in a “special category” — i.e., distinct from the tens of thousands of other Clinton e-mails — because they involved the president. Only the president has power to invoke executive privilege, and Podesta believed such invocation would legitimately cover a communication between Obama and his secretary of state, since such consultations are “the heart of” the privilege recognized by the Supreme Court in United States v. Nixon. (I think he was wrong about that, but that’s a matter for another day.)

There are certainly more damning WikiLeaks revelations. These are 10 that as Crowder says, “You should know about.” Today is the final presidential debate, and WikiLeaks has released the 12th installment this morning. As today is the last day for Trump to bring anything up at the debate, there should be something very interesting in today’s leak. (For more from the author of “10 Outrageous Clintonian Things Exposed by Wikileaks” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Immigration Lunacy: DOJ Seeks to Prosecute Sheriff Arpaio for Enforcing Federal Immigration Law

/0 Comments/in , /by

The inmates are running the asylum. Literally.

In Stolen Sovereignty, I warned about judges granting citizen rights to those who are in the country without the consent of the people and providing them standing to sue for affirmative benefits. Now, in the latest legal assault on Arizona, law enforcement, and sovereignty, illegal aliens have succeeded in getting a radical judge and the Obama Administration to collude against Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and charge him with criminal contempt for enforcing federal immigration and national sovereignty in his jurisdiction, which has been devastated by the effects of illegal immigration. He faces up to six months in jail if convicted of contempt. Meanwhile, the most violent criminal aliens remain at large in the state. This is Orwellian beyond imagination.

In August, Judge G. Murray Snow of the U.S. District Court of Arizona took the unprecedented step of referring Arpaio for misdemeanor criminal contempt charges for allegedly not following a prior court injunction against his police tactics of apprehending those reasonably suspected of being in his jurisdiction illegally. The injunction stems from a 2007 class-action lawsuit brought by the ACLU and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) accusing the Maricopa County Sherriff of racial profiling — the golden goose of liberal litigation against law enforcement. After soliciting federal officials to take action against a sitting sheriff protecting one of the most dangerous jurisdictions, the Obama DOJ took up the mantle and brought charges against Arpaio the day before early voting began in his race for reelection. The charges were brought up at a hearing last Tuesday, called for by Judge Susan Bolton who herself is a notorious liberal activist who has sided with illegal aliens over Arizona sovereignty for years.

When the charges were announced, the Arizona Republic observed the unprecedented nature of this case:

Announcement of the charge, which came minutes into the start of the criminal-contempt proceedings, surprised even those closest to the lawsuit.

“Usually a set status conference is a meeting between the court and council to discuss legal issues,” said Mel McDonald, Arpaio’s defense attorney. “We had no clue that they were going to come here today and make the announcements that they made.”

McDonald said Arpaio will plead not guilty.

Legal experts say the judge and attorneys have little historical guidance moving forward with the case.

“As rare as it is to have a federal judge refer the head of a law-enforcement agency for prosecution, it is even rarer that the Department of Justice would pick up that gauntlet and move forward with the charge,” said Paul Charlton, a former U.S. attorney for the District of Arizona. “It’s unheard of.”

As I note in my book, our Founders are rolling over in their graves at the sight of a sheriff being placed on trial for taking common sense steps to protect his state’s sovereignty and applying federal law in cases of reasonable suspicion laws over which Congress, not the judiciary, has plenary authority. While Arpaio admits to mistakenly violating the injunction, the broader question is how a federal court can issue an injunction against sovereignty laws of a nation using … you guessed it … the Fourteenth Amendment. Arpaio was acting according to federal law, which requires the federal government to respond to state inquiries on an individual’s immigration status [8 U. S. C. §1373c]. Yet, he is potentially facing jail time while illegal aliens chanted “Si se puede! Si se puede!” outside the court house. This is an image and a perverse juxtaposition even Orwell could never have imagined.

A number of important observations are in order:

1. While thousands of criminal aliens are being released onto the streets of Arizona, Sheriff Arpaio is the one who is facing the prospect of jail time. There is something fundamentally wrong when a state like Arizona is being destroyed by a foreign invasion and local elected officials are hamstrung from defending the state, even though they are following federal law. At the same time, sanctuary cities that thwart federal immigration law, are being rewarded by the federal judiciary.

2. While illegal aliens get standing in court to sue over the enforcement of federal immigration laws — as we covered last week — Arpaio and other law enforcement officers were never able to get standing to sue Obama for violating federal immigration law when he implemented the DACA amnesty. As Janice Rogers Brown wrote in her concurring opinion in the Arpaio case where she reluctantly accepted the precedent on standing issues, “if an elected Sheriff responsible for the security of a county with a population larger than twenty-one states cannot bring suit, individual litigants will find it even more difficult to bring similar challenges.” By individual litigants, she meant taxpayers suing on behalf of American sovereignty, not illegal aliens suing to remain in this country against the national will.

3. The legacy of the Supreme Court’s decision in Arizona v. United States — in which the court gutted the state’s ability to protect itself — will make life harder for Arpaio’s defense and any law enforcement agency that wants to protect sovereignty. That decision, which was authored by Justice Anthony Kennedy and joined by Chief Justice John Roberts, was shredded by Justice Antonin Scalia who was so irate he read his dissent from the bench. He warned that the court’s injunction against SB 1070 “deprives States of what most would consider the defining characteristic of sovereignty: the power to exclude from the sovereign’s territory people who have no right to be there.” “Neither the Constitution itself nor even any law passed by Congress supports this result,” wrote an indignant Justice Scalia.

4. How ironic that the courts are now using the Fourteenth Amendment to steal the sovereignty of the nation and the states. House Judiciary Committee Chairman James F. Wilson said during the debate over the 14th Amendment in 1866 that the addition to the Constitution established “no new right” and declared no new principle: “[I]t is not the object of this bill to establish new rights, but to protect and enforce those which belong to every citizen.” Tragically, that amendment — which was designed to protect existing rights of American citizens — is being used to disenfranchise the citizenry at the hands of illegal aliens!

5. Consider the damage wrought upon Arizona by illegal immigration as the sheriff who is protecting his people faces jail time. Here are some key facts from chapter five of my book:

As of 2013, it was estimated that there were 630,700 illegal aliens residing in Arizona (including American-born anchor babies). That is a population of foreign invaders larger than the total population of any single colony at the time of our Founding.

Over 10% of the state’s public school population is comprised of illegal alien children. When coupled with the fiscal strain of health care and incarceration, the total cost of illegal immigration is $2.4 billion a year.

The Arizona Department of Corrections estimates that illegal aliens comprise 17% of its prison population and 22% of all felony defendants in Maricopa County.

Arizona has become the drug smuggling capital of the country. From 2010-2015, heroin seizures in Arizona have increased by 207%, while Methamphetamine seizures grew by 310%. In FY 2014, there were more pounds of Marijuana seized in the Tucson corridor than every other border sector combined.

Arpaio has a grim road ahead of him — as does the entire state of Arizona — if Congress doesn’t strip the courts of their foray into immigration law. Judge Bolton was the original district judge who placed the injunction on SB 1070, Arizona’s enforcement law. The Ninth Circuit is … well … the Ninth Circuit. And Roberts has already agreed with the five leftists on the court that states must follow the whims of international law and the Obama administration instead of congressional statutes.

Scalia used to lament that states would never have joined the union had they been told they would be crushed by the federal courts. As Scalia concluded in his dissent in Arizona, “if securing its territory in this fashion is not within the power of Arizona, we should cease referring to it as a sovereign State.”

Who ever said crime doesn’t pay and cheaters never prosper? (For more from the author of “Immigration Lunacy: DOJ Seeks to Prosecute Sheriff Arpaio for Enforcing Federal Immigration Law” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

CNN Cuts Feed When WikiLeaks Mentioned

/0 Comments/in , /by

During an appearance on CNN this morning, Congressman Chris Collins’ satellite feed was cut as soon as he began talking about Wikileaks.

Host Chris Cuomo asked Collins what he thought Trump could do in tonight’s debate to prove he was fit for office. However, the Congressman went off script.

“Two thirds of the public know that Hillary Clinton’s a liar, she can’t be trusted and now the two faces of Hillary are coming out – the fact through Wikileaks she says one thing and….”

The feed is then immediately cut.

Cuomo continued the discussion with pro-Hillary Congressman Hakeem Jeffries for a full two and a half minutes before Collins returned. Cuomo was sure to ask Collins a question that would steer him away from the subject of Wikileaks. Collins was only then allowed to speak for a brief time before the segment ended. (Read more from “CNN Cuts Feed When WikiLeaks Mentioned” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Final Debate: Trump, Hillary Go for Jugular

/0 Comments/in , /by

With America exactly three weeks from Election Day, GOP nominee Donald Trump challenged Hillary Clinton in a final showdown in Las Vegas, Nevada, Wednesday.

The third – and last – presidential debate of the election season took place at the University of Nevada. Fox News’ Chris Wallace moderated. Debate topics included debt and entitlements, immigration, the economy, Supreme Court, foreign hot spots and Hillary and Trump’s fitness for the presidency.

As his guests, Trump brought Project Veritas’ James O’Keefe; for Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin; President Barack Obama’s Kenyan-born half-brother, Malik; and Patricia Smith, mother of Benghazi victim Sean Smith. He also invited Leslie Millwee, a woman who accused former President Bill Clinton of sexual assault on at least three separate occasions in 1980. Hillary invited well-known billionaires Meg Whitman and Mark Cuban to the event.

The debate began with a question about Supreme Court appointments and interpretation of the Constitution. Wallace said the next president could have two or three appointments and “determine the balance of the court for the next quarter century” . . .

“I feel strongly that the Supreme Court needs to stand on the side of the American people, not on the side of the powerful corporations and wealthy,” Hillary said. She said she wants a court that will reject Citizens United. (Read more from “Final Debate: Trump, Hillary Go for Jugular” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Senators Promise to Block Potential Clinton Supreme Court Nominees

/0 Comments/in , /by

Two U.S. senators say they plan to oppose Hillary Clinton’s Supreme Court nominees should she win the presidency.

In the past week, both Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, have indicated they would continue to block confirmation of a Supreme Court nominee next year.

According to CNN, McCain said in a radio interview that he believes the Republican Party will take a united stand to block Clinton’s nominees.

“I promise you that we will be united against any Supreme Court nominee that Hillary Clinton, if she were president, would put up,” McCain said. “I promise you … ”

According to The Hill, since making this statement on Monday, Rachael Dean, a spokeswoman for McCain, has softened the senator’s claim. She said McCain “will, of course, thoroughly examine the record of any Supreme Court nominee put before the Senate and vote for or against that individual based on their qualifications as he has done throughout his career.”

Lee said that he will oppose potential Supreme Court nominees put forward by Clinton.

“Make no mistake: As a former law clerk … I don’t believe there would be a real substantive distinction, a real noticeable difference between the voting pattern of a justice who would be appointed by a President Hillary Clinton … and Merrick Garland,” Lee said to reporters. “I just don’t think there is much, if any, difference.”

Garland is the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. He was nominated by President Barack Obama to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in February. Garland has yet to be confirmed by the Senate.

Carrie Severino, chief counsel and policy director of the Judicial Crisis Network, a conservative judicial organization, said she is heartened by the fact that Lee and McCain are committed to doing all they can to support nominees whose only agenda is to uphold the Constitution.

“I am very impressed with the stance that the senators are taking,” Severino told The Daily Signal in a phone interview. “They are taking seriously their oath to uphold the Constitution. It is exciting to see them taking their job seriously.”

Severino said it is refreshing to see these senators take the initiative to do what they can to ensure that conservative values will be considered in the Supreme Court nominee process.

In contrast, Marge Baker, executive vice president of People For the American Way, an organization “dedicated to making the promise of America real for every American,” said the statements from Lee and McCain are inappropriate. Baker said in an email to The Daily Signal:

These new statements make clear that Republicans’ blockade of Merrick Garland was never about principle and always about partisanship. With almost a year left in the president’s term when the Supreme Court vacancy first opened up, Republicans said, “let the voters decide” (ignoring the fact that the voters had in fact elected Obama in 2012 for a full four-year term). Now that it’s looking more likely that the voters will elect Hillary Clinton, they’re coming up with new reasons to justify their unconstitutional blockade. Republicans’ refusal to do their job and give fair consideration to a nominee shows a real contempt for the Constitution.

Rather than seeing the opposition of Lee and McCain as “contempt for the Constitution,” Severino said she believes that Clinton is being inconsistent with the way she has been discussing her potential nominees, as Clinton was quite vocal in her opposition to President George W. Bush’s Supreme Court nominees. (For more from the author of “Senators Promise to Block Potential Clinton Supreme Court Nominees” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Wikileaks Emails Show Beyond a Doubt What Hillary Thinks of Americans

/0 Comments/in , /by

WikiLeaks flooded the internet with thousands of leaked emails by Clinton campaign head, John Podesta, exposing serious issues about Hillary Clinton and her team.

The leaked emails caught Clinton using completely different positions depending on whether she was talking to potential supporters in private settings or public campaign stops. On a wide range of important issues, such as immigration, hydraulic fracturing, and trade, Hillary argued two different sides a revelation that adds to the existing doubt about Clinton’s trustworthiness.

In addition, Clinton’s team criticized ordinary Americans for their race, religion, and for living in the South.

Other emails showed CNN contributor and new DNC head Donna Brazile sent a debate question to the Clinton campaign prior to a CNN town hall.

In total, the emails expose Clinton’s duplicitous nature, provide evidence that she will say anything to get elected, and proves that she really meant it when she called Americans a “basket of deplorables.”

I had the opportunity to debate these topics on Fox Business Network’s “Risk & Reward” with guest host Liz MacDonald and Democrat strategist Jessica Tarlov. (For more from the author of “Wikileaks Emails Show Beyond a Doubt What Hillary Thinks of Americans” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Iraqi Refugee Pleads Guilty in ISIS Bomb Plot

/0 Comments/in , /by

No matter how much the other side yaks about screening, you know (and they know) that there is no way to screen the Islamic terrorist wannabes from the huge flow of Syrians, Iraqis, Somalis, Uzbeks, Burmese Muslims etc. being admitted to the US now at an accelerated pace.

Here is a (then) teenager we welcomed to America who hates us and planned to kill many of you who shop in Houston area malls. Before being admitted to the US, I bet this punk was asked by some US State Department worker—do you have any animosity toward America and, like any good Muslim, lied!

From CBS News:

HOUSTON — An Iraqi refugee who authorities say wanted to set off bombs at two Houston malls pleaded guilty Monday to trying to help the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

Omar Faraj Saeed Al Hardan admitted as part of his plea deal that he pledged his loyalty to ISIS in November 2014 and almost immediately trained to use tactical weapons, including an AK-47. He faces up to 20 years in federal prison when he is sentenced Jan. 17 on a charge of attempting to provide material support or resources to a designated foreign terrorist organization.

(Read more from “Iraqi Refugee Pleads Guilty in ISIS Bomb Plot” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.