Special Counsel Jack Smith Asks for More Time to ‘Assess’ Supreme Court’s Immunity Ruling as Trump Demands ‘Total Dismissal’ of 2020 Election Case

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Special Counsel Jack Smith requested more time on Thursday to respond to a scheduling order from the judge handling Donald Trump’s 2020 election interference case, indicating that his office is still grappling with the Supreme Court’s ruling in the former president’s immunity case — nearly a month later.

“The Government continues to assess the new precedent set forth last month in the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. United States, including through consultation with other Department of Justice components,” prosecutors wrote to Judge Tanya Chutkan in a status report filed with the DC District Court.

“Although those consultations are well underway, the Government has not finalized its position on the most appropriate schedule for the parties to brief issues related to the decision,” Smith’s office said.

“The Government therefore respectfully requests additional time to provide the Court with an informed proposal regarding the schedule for pretrial proceedings moving forward.”

The Supreme Court ruled on July 1 that Trump, 78, is subject to absolute immunity from prosecution for “official acts” during his presidency and left it up to lower courts to sort out what constitutes an “official act” by a sitting president. (Read more from “Special Counsel Jack Smith Asks for More Time to ‘Assess’ Supreme Court’s Immunity Ruling as Trump Demands ‘Total Dismissal’ of 2020 Election Case” HERE)

Biden Appears Confused During His Only Public Event This Week: ‘What Am I Doing?’

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President Biden openly expressed confusion about what he should be doing Thursday at his only scheduled public event of the week — and had to be reminded by an emcee to leave a White House celebration of the Texas Rangers’ World Series win, which he did after saluting the athletes.

Biden, 81, ended his campaign for a second term on July 21 after a mutiny by fellow Democrats concerned about his mental acuity, but he has insisted that he remains capable of serving as president through Jan. 20 — despite his noticeably sparse schedule.

“All right, what am I doing now?” Biden said after wrapping up the event by accepting a personalized jersey and cowboy boots from the baseball team in the White House’s East Room.

A military aide approached Biden to collect the gifts, with the president seeming to joke, “Are you stealing my jersey?”

Biden, who has hosted dozens of events in the same room, then stood awkwardly looking around for direction — at one point raising both hands in an apparent questioning gesture, indicating he wasn’t sure what to do. (Read more from “Biden Appears Confused During His Only Public Event This Week: ‘What Am I Doing?’” HERE)

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr

Report: Pakistani Charged With Murder Plot Against Trump Was Allowed Into U.S. on ‘Public Benefit Parole’

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A Pakistani national, now charged with a murder-for-hire plot against former President Donald Trump, was allowed into the United States on “significant public benefit parole” despite reportedly being on the government’s “watch list.”

On Tuesday, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced charges against 46-year-old Asif Raza Merchant of Pakistan for allegedly attempting to carry out a murder-of-hire plot against Trump and other politicians.

In an unsealed complaint against Merchant, federal prosecutors allege that he first flew into George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Texas, on April 13 in the hopes of recruiting U.S.-based assassins to carry out the assassination plot.

According to documents that Just the News obtained, Merchant was interviewed, fingerprinted, and inspected following his arrival at the Houston airport. At the time of his inspection, federal agents noticed that Merchant had taken recent trips to Iran, a hotbed for Islamic terrorism.

Just the News reports that Merchant’s immigration records, available to federal agents at the time he arrived in Houston, “clearly stated in bright red that he was flagged by the Department of Homeland Security database with the identifier ‘WATCH LIST’ and denoted as a ‘Lookout Qualified Person of Interest.’” (Read more from “Report: Pakistani Charged With Murder Plot Against Trump Was Allowed Into U.S. on ‘Public Benefit Parole’” HERE)

Report: Tim Walz Faced ‘Stolen Valor’ Accusations in 2006 That He Denied

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Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the current vice president pick for 2024 Democrat presidential nominee Kamala Harris, has been aware of stolen valor accusations going back to 2006, according to a report from CNN.

While Walz’s service in the U.S. National Guard remains undisputed, his use of the rank “retired Command Sergeant Major” has sparked accusations of stolen valor as well as his claims to have carried weapons “in war,” even though he never served in war or a combat zone. As Breitbart News reported, Walz “listed on his official biography a higher military rank than the one he ultimately retired with, drawing criticism from some veterans”:

Walz served in the Minnesota Army National Guard and retired at the rank of master sergeant, or an E-8. However, on his official website bio, he lists a higher rank that he served at for a short period that ultimately was rescinded, as he did not complete all the requirements to serve at that rank. However, his bio implies that he retired at the rank of command sergeant major, or an E-9.

. . .

According to CNN, Walz encountered criticisms of his service characterizations going all the way back to 2006 during his run for U.S. Congress, which he denied at the time. Per the report:

That year, multiple letters to his local paper in Mankato, Minnesota, accused him of making misleading statements about his service, including whether he had served in Iraq or Afghanistan.

(Read more from “Report: Tim Walz Faced ‘Stolen Valor’ Accusations in 2006 That He Denied” HERE)

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FBI Raids Home of Ex-UN Weapons Inspector & Anti-War Pundit Scott Ritter

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On Wednesday the upstate New York home of Scott Ritter was raided by the FBI and state police. The FBI has since confirmed in a statement that this is part of an ongoing federal investigation into Ritter.

Agents were seen entering his house in Delmar, NY in widely shared photographs and local media footage in the afternoon. It was unclear if Ritter was at home at the time and the allegations at the center of the investigation remain unknown.

“I can confirm FBI personnel are at a home on Dover [Drive] conducting law enforcement activity in connection with an ongoing federal investigation,” a statement from the FBI’s Albany office confirmed. “As the investigation is ongoing, [Department of Justice] policy prevents me from commenting further.”

Ritter became a prominent figure as the chief UN weapons inspector in the 1990s in Iraq and ex-intelligence official (Marine Corp intelligence) who publicly opposed the George W. Bush administration’s drive to take the United States into war with Iraq.

He subsequently became a popular anti-war pundit and leading critic of US foreign policy. For an example of his ongoing criticisms of the US government and foreign policy, he wrote in 2019, “I love my country, but the collective ignorance of the American people empowers so-called public servants who abuse their positions of trust to push policies that further individual agendas at the expense of the nation they ostensibly serve. Fact-based logic no longer matters.”

More recently he has been a fierce critic of US policy related to the war in Ukraine, having also made several trips to Russia during the course of the war which began in February 2022.

(Read more from “FBI Raids Home of Ex-UN Weapons Inspector & Anti-War Pundit Scott Ritter” HERE)

George Floyd Redux: 4 Hotel Employees Who Removed “Morbidly Obese” and Drugged-Out Man From Woman’s Restroom Charged With Murder

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According to a criminal complaint, the four employees dragged [decedent] Mitchell out of the Hyatt Hotel on June 30 after he entered a women’s bathroom and held him on his stomach for eight or nine minutes. . .

An autopsy showed that Mitchell suffered from morbid obesity and had ingested cocaine and methamphetamine, the complaint said.

Hyatt surveillance video shows Mitchell frantically running into the hotel’s lobby and then into the gift shop before entering the women’s bathroom, the complaint said.

A few seconds later, a woman emerges and Turner, who was off duty but happened to be visiting staff at that moment, drags Mitchell out of the bathroom into the lobby by his shirt.

[One of those charged, a hotel guard,] told investigators that Mitchell was very strong and kept resisting them and tried to bite him. But the guard said he never did anything to intentionally hurt or harm Mitchell. [Another charged employee] told a detective that he heard women screaming in the bathroom after Mitchell entered it, and he thought Mitchell was on drugs. (Read more from “George Floyd Redux: 4 Hotel Employees Who Removed “Morbidly Obese” and Drugged-Out Man From Woman’s Restroom Charged With Murder” HERE)

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VP Pick Walz’s Church Doesn’t Like to Call God ‘Him,’ Supports Reparations and Pride Parades

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Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz attends a church that preaches beliefs related to gender, race and sexuality that many Christian denominations strongly oppose.

Walz, who is the governor of Minnesota, identified Pilgrim Lutheran Church in St. Paul as his parish during a 2020 briefing on the COVID-19 pandemic. Materials published by Pilgrim Lutheran Church instruct parishioners not to refer to God using male pronouns, push congregants to support reparation funds, encourage them to celebrate Ramadan and include a modified gender-neutral version of the Lord’s Prayer, among other liberal practices.

Pilgrim Lutheran Church is part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), a mainline protestant denomination that has been criticized by some conservative Christians for ordaining transgender and lesbian bishops as well as for its embrace of LGBT ideology.

“The ELCA is, broadly speaking, a liberal American mainline Protestant denomination,” Jonah Wendt, a policy adviser for Mike Pence’s Advancing American Freedom and a member of the Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “They reject the inerrancy of scripture, ordain women to the pastoral office [and] hold what many would believe to be unbiblical views on abortion and homosexual behavior.”

Pilgrim Lutheran Church in 2015 approved “guidelines for language in worship” wherein the congregation asserted that “a patriarchal culture gave birth to the writing of scripture and the selection of the canon” and, to rectify the purported injustice, committed to using gender-neutral language to describe God. Members of the church, for instance, are encouraged to “choose non-anthropomorphic language” like “hen” or “baker” to refer to God, and urged “not to limit these by following them with male or female pronouns.” (Read more from “VP Pick Walz’s Church Doesn’t Like to Call God ‘Him,’ Supports Reparations and Pride Parades” HERE)

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr

Trump Leads Harris in North Carolina’s First Statewide Poll Since Switch

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Former President Donald Trump leads Vice President Kamala Harris by 3 points in the newest statewide polling of North Carolinians.

The consensus battleground state, sending electoral college votes to Republicans in 12 of the last 14 cycles dating to a Lyndon B. Johnson win in 1964, has been a prime rally location since before Harris became the Democrats’ nominee.

Raleigh was the first site visited by President Joe Biden after his infamous June 27 debate against Trump.

A rally by Harris this week is getting reset due to Debby, the former hurricane that is slowly moving up the Atlantic Seaboard closing out the week. . .

Trump outpolled Harris 44%-41% among 714 likely voters sampled between July 31 and Aug. 3. (Read more from “Trump Leads Harris in North Carolina’s First Statewide Poll Since Switch” HERE)

Photo credit: Gage Skidmore via Flickr

Lawsuit: Maricopa County’s Election Chief is Unlawfully Refusing to Undertake Proper Voter List Maintenance

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Maricopa County’s election chief is illegally refusing to undertake required voter list maintenance procedures to ensure foreign nationals aren’t voting in Arizona elections, a lawsuit filed Monday alleges.

Brought on behalf of the Strong Communities Foundation of Arizona and resident Yvonne Cahill, the legal challenge argues that GOP Recorder Stephen Richer is “ignor[ing]” his legally-required duties “to ensure that foreign citizens are removed from Maricopa County’s voter rolls.” Richer — a staunch opponent of election integrity efforts in Arizona — lost his reelection bid during Arizona’s primary elections last week.

“This lawsuit seeks to restore public trust in our State’s electoral system by holding Recorder Richer accountable for his failures and to ensure that the list maintenance required by the law and common sense — is performed,” the legal filing reads.

Plaintiffs are represented by America First Legal (AFL) and a law firm headed by former Arizona Assistant Attorney General Jennifer Wright.

The issue seemingly began last month when AFL sent letters to Arizona’s 15 county recorders demanding they fulfill their statutory obligation to verify the citizenship of the state’s Federal-Only voters. In Arizona, individuals who do not provide documentary proof of citizenship (DPOC) when registering to vote are permitted to do so as “Federal-Only Voters” and cast ballots in federal elections. That allowance is due to a 2013 U.S. Supreme Court ruling known as Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Ariz., Inc. (Read more from “Lawsuit: Maricopa County’s Election Chief is Unlawfully Refusing to Undertake Proper Voter List Maintenance” HERE)

Hunter Biden Hired by Foreign Oligarch to ‘Influence’ U.S. Government: Prosecutors

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The federal prosecutor overseeing an investigation into Hunter Biden claims a Romanian oligarch attempted to use his business connections with President Joe Biden’s son to wield influence over the Biden administration.

Special counsel David Weiss’s office argued Gabriel Popoviciu hired Hunter Biden because he wanted “to attempt to influence U.S. government agencies,” according to court filings released Wednesday.

In 2015, Popoviciu, a Romanian real estate tycoon, hired Hunter Biden as he faced a loss of his business assets over a Romanian criminal corruption case, per prosecutors. Bank records show Hunter Biden and his business associates received at least $3 million from Popoviciu over the next two years.

House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) said the “Biden family’s influence peddling schemes” in Romania were laid out by them in May of last year.

“Bank records don’t lie. The mainstream media took their marching orders from the Biden White House & turned a blind eye to public corruption,” he wrote on X.

(Read more from “Hunter Biden Hired by Foreign Oligarch to ‘Influence’ U.S. Government: Prosecutors” HERE)