CIA: ISIS Attack on US ‘Inevitable’

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By John Hayward. In his 60 Minutes interview last Sunday, CIA Director John Brennan warned that Islamic State attacks (ISIS/ISIL) on U.S. soil are “inevitable.” He came close to blaming political correctness for interfering with efforts to detect and thwart terror plots.

When interviewer Scott Pelley asked if Brennan expects an Islamic State attack in the United States, the CIA director replied, “I’m expecting them to try to put in place the operatives, the material or whatever else that they need to do or to incite people to carry out these attacks, clearly. So I believe that their attempts are inevitable. I don’t think their successes necessarily are.”

Pelley asked Brennan to describe to the audience ISIS’ motivations for killing Americans. His answer was brief, but not inconsistent with the controversial warning from presidential candidate Ben Carson about “civilizational jihad.”

The difference is that Brennan sees ISIS, and presumably other organized extremists groups like al-Qaeda, as outside agents trying to “provoke a clash between the West and the Muslim world,” recruiting supporters with false claims that “the United States is trying to take over their countries.”

Brennan credited U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies with doing excellent work to prevent terrorist attacks, but he said that “we have to work harder.” His call for giving the intelligence community greater “technical capabilities” included a call for backdoor access to encrypted online communications. (Read more from “CIA: ISIS Attack on US ‘Inevitable'” HERE)

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EU Police Chief Warns That 5,000 Jihadists Returned From Middle East — and New Attack Is Likely

By Justin Huggler. Up to 5,000 jihadists trained in the Middle East could be at large in Europe, the EU’s police chief has warned.

“Europe is currently facing the highest terror threat in more than 10 years,” said Rob Wainwright, the British head of Europol, the EU’s police agency.

Thousands of EU citizens have returned to their home countries after being trained by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Wainwright said.

“We can expect ISIL or other religious terror groups to stage an attack somewhere in Europe with the aim of achieving mass casualties among the civilian population,” he told Germany’s Neue Osnabrucker Zeitung newspaper. (Read more from “EU Police Chief Warns That 5,000 Jihadists Returned From Middle East — and New Attack Is Likely” HERE)

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The Obama Administration Wants to Make Sure Non-Citizens Vote in the Upcoming Election

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Several well-funded organizations — including the League of Women Voters and the NAACP — are fighting efforts to prevent non-citizens from voting illegally in the upcoming presidential election. And the United States Department of Justice, under the direction of Attorney General Loretta Lynch, is helping them.

On February 12, these groups filed a lawsuit in D.C. federal court seeking to reverse a recent decision by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC). The Commission’s decision allows Kansas and other states, including Arizona and Georgia, to enforce state laws ensuring that only citizens register to vote when they use a federally designed registration form. An initial hearing in the case is set for Monday afternoon, February 22.

Under federal law, the EAC is responsible for designing the federal voter-registration form required by the National Voter Registration Act, or Motor Voter, as it is commonly called. While states must register voters who use the federal form, states can ask the EAC to include instructions with the federal form about additional state registration requirements. Some states are now requiring satisfactory proof of citizenship to ensure that only citizens register to vote.

Under Article I, Secion 2 and the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution, states have the power to set the “Qualification requisite for electors.” As with many issues, the Left disdains the balance the Framers adopted in the Constitution and objects to this delegation of power to the states. They prefer to see power over elector eligibility centralized in Washington, D.C. (Read more from “The Obama Administration Wants to Make Sure Non-Citizens Vote in the Upcoming Election” HERE)

Watch a recent interview with the author below:

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Flow of Illegal Alien Children Into U.S. Expected to Rise in 2016

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By Adam Kredo. The flow of illegal immigrant children into the United States is expected to rise to record-breaking numbers in 2016 as deportations decrease, according to leading members of the Senate’s Judiciary Committee.

At least 20,455 unaccompanied minors have been caught during fiscal year 2016 along the U.S.-Mexico border as of last month, according to committee chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa), who warned that if this trend continues, the number of illegal minors could eclipse a massive 2014 surge that strained the resources of the Department of Homeland Security and prompted investigations into the Obama administration’s handling of the issue.

While illegal border crossings surge, the number of children actually being deported from the United States is declining, senators said during a Tuesday hearing with senior Obama administration officials.

The hearing comes just a day after oversight officials disclosed that the Obama administration has lost track of scores of immigrant children, many of whom are being released from custody to individuals across the United States who have not gone through thorough background checks.

“If these trends continue, we can expect to see an even greater number of minors crossing the border this year than in 2014,” Grassley said. “No one is following up on these individuals when they skip their immigration hearings, unless they are receiving post-release services. They are also not enforcement priorities for this administration. This means a lot of these minors are nowhere to be found.” (Read more from “Flow of Illegal Alien Children Into U.S. Expected to Rise in 2016” HERE)

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Sessions: Feds Let 97 Percent of Border Crisis Kids Stay in U.S.

By Joel Gehrke. Only about 3 or 4 percent of the unaccompanied minors who have entered the country in the last two-and-a-half years have been returned to their home countries, Sen. Jeff Sessions charged on Tuesday.

“It cannot be that every young person that appears from Central America is entitled to asylum or entry into the united states, contrary to our laws,” Sessions said during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday. “It just cannot be. Does anybody in this government not understand that?”

Immigration officials testified that the border crisis could be mitigated if more people were sent home. “I don’t disagree with that,” Thomas Homan, a senior official at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, told Sessions. “I think if you have a consequence of deterrence to illegal activity, the illegal activity will slow down.”

The Alabama Republican noted that 4,680 of the 127,000 minors who have arrived in the last two-and-a-half years have been returned. Senate Democrats argued that increasing the number of returns would be inhumane, although GOP lawmakers pointed to cases of unaccompanied children being released to criminals to argue that President Obama’s policies are creating another kind of humanitarian crisis. (Read more from “Sessions: Feds Let 97 Percent of Border Crisis Kids Stay in U.S.” HERE)

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Trump Vouched for Cocaine Trafficker

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Presidential contender Donald Trump, who has vowed to stanch the flow of narcotics and criminals entering the U.S. from Mexico, once wrote to a judge urging leniency for a friend who was convicted of distributing kilos of cocaine that had been smuggled into the country from Colombia, court records show.

In advance of Joseph Weichselbaum’s November 1987 sentencing by a U.S. District Court judge, Trump wrote that the drug trafficker was “conscientious, forthright, diligent and a credit to the community.”

At the time Trump wrote his character reference letter, Weichselbaum, then in his mid-40s, was already a twice-convicted felon. In addition to his 1986 plea to federal cocaine distribution and income tax charges, Weichselbaum’s rap sheet included prior convictions for grand theft auto and the embezzlement of more than $130,000 from a Brooklyn manufacturing firm where he worked for a decade.

Weichselbaum, who peddled drugs and palled around with wiseguys, seemed an odd choice for Trump to publicly embrace. Especially since the developer–who has never been known for empathetic gestures–owned casinos monitored by New Jersey regulators on the alert for licensees who maintained business or personal relationships with unsavory types.

In a court filing that referred to the laudatory correspondence sent by Trump and other Weichselbaum cronies, a federal prosecutor mocked the letters. Weichselbaum, the government lawyer wrote, used his friends to vouch for his redeeming qualities and claim that his criminal activities were a one-time aberration and “totally out of his character.” These friends, prosecutor Ann Marie Tracey sneered, apparently were “unaware of defendant’s previous convictions and his extensive drug dealings.” Weichselbaum, the prosecutor noted in another filing, “was a felon even before becoming a drug dealer.” (Read more from “Trump Vouched for Cocaine Trafficker” HERE)

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Franklin Graham: Charlotte, NC Passes Wicked, Filthy and Ludicrous Law Allowing Perverts Into Women’s Restrooms

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A few hours before the Charlotte City Council’s vote on transgender access to public restrooms for the opposite sex, Franklin Graham posted this hard-hitting call to action on Facebook:

Tonight the Charlotte, NC, City Council is set to vote on an ordinance that allows people to use the public restroom of their choice regardless of their biological sex. It’s really hard to believe that such a ludicrous law would even be seriously considered—and even harder to believe that at least 8 of 11 council members have said they would vote for it! Are people just not thinking clearly? This law would allow pedophiles, perverts, and predators into women’s bathrooms. This is wicked and it’s filthy. To think that my granddaughters could go into a restroom and a man be in there exposing himself….what are we setting our children and grandchildren up for? There’s not a public restroom in Charlotte that would be safe!

It should be inconceivable that Charlotte’s mayor and the supporting City Council members have succumbed to the pressures from depraved sexual activists and are willing to put women and girls at risk like this. The ordinance was defeated last year, and the mayor shouldn’t have allowed it back on the table. Shame on her. This is why it is so important that Christians get involved in the political process across our country by running for office and by voting. What a difference it could make if we had more city council members and mayors who were willing to stand up for morality and biblical principles for our cities and communities. Less than 10% of voters turned out for the last Charlotte mayoral election—that’s just a shame, and look what’s happening as a result.

I hope Charlotte citizens will come out in droves this evening to gather at 4:45 in front of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Government Complex Building before the City Council meeting and let the council know without question that they overwhelmingly oppose this! And to the rest of the nation—more of these kinds of laws are coming, so be watching, be on guard, and fight against them.

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Charlotte Passes Law Allowing Transgender People to Use the Opposite Sex’s Restrooms

By Tom Foreman Jr. and Jonathan Drew. North Carolina’s largest city passed a law Monday allowing transgender people to choose public bathrooms that correspond to their gender identity, which the governor had called a threat to public safety and warned that the General Assembly may step in.

The Charlotte City Council voted 7-4 to expand protections based on sexual orientation and gender identity, making it the latest frontier in a national debate on how businesses treat gay, lesbian and transgender customers. One of the revisions to the city’s nondiscrimination ordinance allows people to choose restrooms corresponding to the gender with which they identify.

“I’m pleased that Charlotte has sent a signal that we will treat people with dignity and respect, even when we disagree,” Charlotte Mayor Jennifer Roberts said moments after the vote. (Read more from “Charlotte Passes Law Allowing Transgender People to Use the Opposite Sex’s Restrooms” HERE)

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Trump Questions Rubio’s Eligibility

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Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump has continuously questioned Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s ability to legally run for president and now, on Saturday, the real estate mogul questioned Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s eligibility and suggesting he is not a citizen.

Trump took to Twitter, retweeting:

At nine minutes into the video, the litigation attorney claims that Rubio is not a naturalized citizen becuase he was born in the United States to Cuban parents who were not yet citizens.

[Rubio responded to Trump’s claims stating,] “I’m going to spend zero time on his interpretation of the Constitution with regards to eligibility.” (Read more from “Trump Questions Rubio’s Eligibility” HERE)

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Something Terrifying Was Just Revealed About Obama’s Gitmo Policy

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President Obama’s push to close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility may be forcing the Department of Defense to release suspected terrorists newly captured by U.S. forces overseas, according to a Republican lawmaker and former Marine.

Rep. Duncan Hunter (R., Calif.) recently penned a letter to Defense Secretary Ash Carter expressing concern that Obama’s refusal to send new terrorist suspects to Guantanamo Bay is allowing them to return to the battlefield to fight U.S. forces and resume acts of terrorism.

“Given the clear position of Congress on the proposed closure of Guantanamo Bay and the prohibition on detainee transfers to domestic facilities, I am concerned that the Department of Defense is being forced to relinquish control of dangerous individuals captured by U.S. forces due to the president’s refusal to utilize Guantanamo Bay for new detention cases,” Hunter wrote to Carter on January 28.

“And once in foreign custody, an individual’s release can occur despite the best efforts of the U.S. to keep that individual in custody,” Hunter continued. “An already high-rate of recidivism adds to the probability that some individuals will subsequently reengage U.S. forces on the battlefield or resume terrorist activity. This puts American lives at risk.”

Obama, who promised to shut down Guantanamo Bay when he took office, has blocked captured terrorist suspects from being sent to the military prison. This, coupled with the United States’ closure of the detention facility near the Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan at the end of 2014, raises questions about the Pentagon’s ability to detain suspected terrorists captured under the Authorization for Use of Military Force, Hunter wrote. (Read more from “Something Terrifying Was Just Revealed About Obama’s Gitmo Policy” HERE)

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Lisa Murkowski – the Most Liberal GOP Senator Seeking Reelection – Called out for Waffling on Scalia Replacement

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As the fight to replace Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia heats up, the conservative grassroots are holding potentially waffling Republican senators’ feet to the fire. . .

Fourteen Republicans would have to join with the 46 Democrats in the Senate in order to approve an Obama nominee to the court. So far, 31 of the GOP senators have ruled out voting for a replacement for Scalia this year, leaving 23 who have not ruled out casting the vote, the New York Times reported.

Murkowski, who is the most liberal Republican seeking re-election in 2016, initially told reporters in Alaska last Wednesday that “I do believe that the nominee should get a hearing,” adding, “That doesn’t necessarily mean that that ends up in a vote. The purpose of the hearing is to determine whether or not this individual, based on their record … should be named to the highest court in the land.”

After receiving blowback from Hewitt and others, the senator appeared to walk back her statement the next day, posting on Facebook: “While the President has the Constitutional prerogative to send a nominee to the Senate for consent, it is left to the Senate to determine how to proceed after that. Given the timing of this vacancy, in the middle of our Presidential election, the American people will clearly be weighing in on the direction of the Supreme Court.”

She went on to urge President Barack Obama to follow precedent and allow his successor to appoint a replacement for Justice Scalia, and acknowledged the Senate does have the right to deny the nominee an up or down vote.

Hewitt accused Murkowski of waffling, implying she may not be reliable in the effort to block an Obama nominee.

(Read more from “Lisa Murkowski – the Most Liberal GOP Senator Seeking Reelection – Called out for Waffling on Scalia Replacement” HERE)

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Cruz Fires Top Campaign Spokesman Over Rubio Bible Video

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By Fox News. Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz said Monday he’s fired campaign communications director Rick Tyler, after his top spokesman promoted a video that wrongly depicted Florida Sen. Marco Rubio as trash-talking the Bible.

The Texas senator announced that he’s asked for the resignation at a press conference Monday afternoon.

“We are not a campaign that is going to question the faith of another candidate. Even if it was true, our campaign should not have sent it. That’s why I’ve asked for Rick Tyler’s resignation,” Cruz said in Nevada, ahead of the state’s GOP caucuses on Tuesday. “The standards of conduct in this campaign have been made absolutely clear.”

Tyler originally had linked to a story showing a video of Rubio walking by a Cruz staffer and Cruz’s father Rafael, who were reading the Bible in a hotel lobby. The original subtitles on the video showed Rubio saying to the staffer, “Got a good book there, not many answers in it.”

But after Tyler linked to the story, Rubio communications director Alex Conant tweeted out the same video with what he says are the correct subtitles — and they tell a very different story. (Read more from “Cruz Fires Top Campaign Spokesman Over Rubio Bible Video” HERE)

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Cruz Campaign Memo Trashes Rubio

By Ryan Lovelace. A memo from Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s chief strategist trashes Florida Sen. Marco Rubio’s presidential bid.

Under the headline, “Ted Cruz is the only candidate who can defeat Trump,” Jason Johnson, Cruz’s chief strategist, made a case against Rubio.

“Marco Rubio cannot beat Trump,” Johnson wrote. “Trump can’t be beaten from the political Left, with a candidate who emphatically supports amnesty and who allows Trump to be considered the “conservative” in that context.”

Johnson argues that Rubio has failed to detail a successful strategy after the first three nominating states have cast their ballots. (Read more from “Cruz Campaign Memo Trashes Rubio” HERE)

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Law Enforcement Sides With Chris Crane After Rubio’s Anti-ICE Tirade

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Law enforcement are vocally backing Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council President Chris Crane following Sen. Marco Rubio’s apparent attempt to discredit Crane, an ICE officer of 13 years and U.S. veteran.

Crane has been described by Senator Sen. Jeff Sessions, a renowned leader in the conservative nation-state movement, as “an American hero” for blowing the whistle on immigration corruption.

Following an exclusive interview with Breitbart News in which Crane detailed how law enforcement was treated “like absolute trash” by Sen. Rubio during his effort to ram the Gang of Eight amnesty bill through the Senate, Rubio took to national television to denounce Crane and his service to his country.

“He’s not an ICE official. He’s the head of a union,” Rubio declared on Fox News when asked about the criticism leveled by Crane. “That individual is not an ICE official; he’s the head of a union,” Rubio responded.

Prominent sheriffs throughout the country, however, have rushed to Crane’s aide–praising him for his “courage to tell the truth amidst attacks.” (Read more from “Law Enforcement Sides With Chris Crane After Rubio’s Anti-ICE Tirade” HERE)

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