White House Panel on Voter Fraud Begins Work

A presidential commission to examine voter fraud and the soundness of election systems across the country has a big job ahead as it convenes Wednesday for the first time.

Not only is the Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity charged with investigating what to do about voter fraud cases and establishing best practices, it must do so despite meeting with resistance from some state election officials.

The initial meeting, set for 11 a.m. in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, will be livestreamed on WhiteHouse.gov.

One tool at the commission’s disposal is a database from The Heritage Foundation that compiles 1,071 cases of proven instances of voter fraud across the United States, the bulk of them prosecuted since 2000.

Most of those cases, 938, ended in a criminal conviction. Another 43 ended in civil penalties. A judge directed the defendant into a pretrial diversion program in 74 cases, and 16 ended in judicial or official findings.

The cases of proven fraud took place in 47 states, according to the database.

“A big advantage of the database is that it shows all the different ways that fraud can be committed,” commission member Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal. “It demonstrates, for example, you don’t only have to worry about vote-buying. A lot of cases involved that, but you also have to worry about what are the rules governing absentee ballots, since there are a lot of cases in the database of people casting absentee ballots.”

The Daily Signal is Heritage’s multimedia news organization.

President Donald Trump created the bipartisan commission through an executive order in May. He named Vice President Mike Pence as chairman and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, also a Republican, as co-chairman.

The 12-member commission includes three current or former Democratic officeholders: New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner, Maine Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap, and former Arkansas state Rep. David Dunn.

The agenda for the first meeting appears broad, not focused on specific issues of ensuring clean elections.

Trump has complained of 3 million to 5 million fraudulent votes in the 2016 presidential election that lifted Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s vote tally. Critics of the commission, including California Secretary of State Alex Padilla, a Democrat who oversees elections in that state, have said the panel is only trying to prove Trump actually won the popular vote as well as the Electoral College.

But von Spakovsky says that is not the goal.

“The whole purpose of the commission is to take a look at the entire American election process, from the voter registration system, to the casting of ballots, to counting of ballots, to the security—including cybersecurity—that surrounds all of this,” said von Spakovsky, previously both a Justice Department lawyer and member of the Federal Election Commission. “We’re not only trying to look at what problems exist, but also [determine] have people taken advantage of those problems.”

Despite resistance from some states in providing information to the commission, White House press secretary Sean Spicer said he believes most state election data will be obtainable—and without buying it, as political campaigns and private companies do.

“Most of this information is available,” Spicer told The Daily Signal. “All that those companies are doing is buying it from the states. So I don’t think there would be any reason to go to a private vendor. I think we should be able to do this utilizing official resources that exist within a state. “

He added:

Again, I think there’s been some miscommunication on what they’re seeking. The commission has asked that each state provide that information that is public, that they share. And because that varies from state to state, what they’re willing to give out, the commission was illustrative in its letter [to state election officials] in trying to describe what it was looking for. But I think we’re going to move forward very well.

Liberal groups such as the Brennan Center for Justice and the League of Women Voters, which have opposed voter ID laws and other voter integrity measures, sued Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson, a Republican commission member, because she’s providing the information.

Voter ID laws require voters to first show photo identification, such as a driver’s license or a special voter ID card, to demonstrate they are who they say they are and live where they say they do.

“The commission cannot bypass state rules designed to protect sensitive voter information,” said Myrna Pérez, deputy director of the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program, in a public statement. “Lawson might be a member of this panel, but her first duty is to the Hoosiers who trusted her with personal information so that they could participate in fair and free elections in the state. She must proceed carefully and with legally mandated procedures before sharing voter data.”

Pence is the former governor of Indiana, which he also represented in the U.S. House.

The panel likely will push best practices among states, such as voter ID and updating voter registration rolls, said Jason Snead, a legal policy analyst with The Heritage Foundation, who studies voter fraud and helps maintain the think tank’s database on voter fraud.

Snead noted a Pew Research Center study that found 1.8 million dead people were listed as voters, 12 million records with incorrect data, and 2.75 million persons registered in more than one state. (For more from the author of “White House Panel on Voter Fraud Begins Work” please click HERE)

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Pantsuit on Fire: Hillary Haunted by Own (Mis)Conduct

More than eight months after Hillary Clinton’s election loss, her use of a private email server and other conduct during her tenure as U.S. secretary of state continue to haunt her.

A newly released batch of documents obtained by Judicial Watch showcases numerous instances of Clinton Foundation donors receiving favors from the State Department.

In one email exchange, Huma Abedin, Clinton’s former deputy chief of staff in the State Department and longtime aide, negotiated who the next the U.S. ambassador to Barbados would be after Clinton Global Initiative executive Doug Band recommended a candidate to fill the position.

“I know, he’s emailed a few times,” Abedin said in reply to Band’s request. “But she wants to give someone else.”

Another exchange shows Band instructing Abedin to “show love” to Andrew Liveris, CEO of Dow Chemical. (Read more from “Pantsuit on Fire: Hillary Haunted by Own (Mis)Conduct” HERE)

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Lawmaker Makes Physical Threat Against ‘P—Y’ Trump

A Democratic state lawmaker in Maine appears to have threatened President Trump in a Facebook post – calling the president a “p—y’ and saying he plans to make Trump a “half term president.”

“Trump is a half term president, at most, especially if I ever get within 10 feet of that p—y,” wrote Rep. Scott Hamann Tuesday evening.

Hamann, who represents a South Portland district, blasted a Trump supporter in his now-deleted Facebook tirade in which he called the president “anti-American” and an “admitted rapist” who was “installed by the Russians.”

In his vicious attack on the Trump supporter and the president, Hamann wrote (warning: explicit content):

(Read more from “Lawmaker Makes Physical Threat Against ‘P—Y’ Trump” HERE)

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U.S. Army Mandates That Soldiers With Penises Who Identify as Women Must Shower With Women; ‘Mattis Is a Coward’

Female soldiers must give “dignity and respect” to transsexual men who join them in their shared shower rooms, according to training manuals leaked by soldiers in a mandatory class.

But this “dignity and respect” is a one-way street, according to the training slides, which were developed by officials working for former President Barack Obama. “Transgender Soldiers are not required or expected to modify or adjust their behavior based on the fact that they do not ‘match’ other Soldiers,” according to the slides, which were first leaked by TheFederalist.com:

The insistence that women remain mute when a man enters their shower room “shows a lack of respect for the vast majority of service members [because] no consideration is given to their feeling about this circumstances,” said Peter Sprigg, senior policy studies expert at the Family Research Council in Washington.

Female soldiers in showers are supposed to ignore visible biology and “act as if nothing has happened when some male … is all of a sudden in the shower room with them,” said Austen Ruse, president of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute. “This is a flat-out humiliation of women. … Females will have their dignity and respect violated [and] they are being told this does not matter even a little bit,” he added.

Female soldiers will not even be allowed to cover themselves because it could signal a lack of “respect” for the transsexual man in the shower, Ruse said. (Read more from “U.S. Army Mandates That Soldiers With Penises Who Identify as Women Must Shower With Women; ‘Mattis Is a Coward'” HERE)

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Transgender-Gang Feud Leaves Teen Dead

The weekend fatal shooting of a teen at an apartment complex near downtown Athens was the culmination of a feud between two transgender groups, Athens-Clarke County police confirmed Wednesday.

Rayquann Deonte Jernigan, 17, who was known to friends by the chosen name of Ava Le’Ray Barrin, was killed Sunday morning by a single gunshot fired by 21-year-old Jalen Breon Brown in the parking lot of Riverview Apartments on College Avenue, police said.

Neither lived in the complex and both were there to visit friends who did live there when the deadly confrontation occurred, said Capt. Jerry Saulters, commanding officer of the Athens-Clarke County police Criminal Investigations Division. (Read more from “Transgender-Gang Feud Leaves Teen Dead” HERE)

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With Senators Like These, Obamacare Repeal Was Always a Tease

This week will be marked by raging debate over the Better Care Reconciliation Act, the Senate’s version of Obamacare-lite that is drawing a swarm of criticism from conservatives for failing to repeal Obamacare and from moderate and liberal Republicans for going too far toward repealing Obamacare. Over the weekend, several U.S. senators clarified their position on the bill – casting doubts on the feasibility of its passage in its current form.

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., elaborated on his opposition to the current version of the BCRA in an op-ed published at the New York times, explaining that “it relies too heavily on government spending, and ignores the role that the private sector can and should play.”

“Once again, a simple solution is obvious,” Johnson writes. “Loosen up regulations and mandates, so that Americans can choose to purchase insurance that suits their needs and that they can afford.”

“Like many other senators, I had hoped that this was where things were headed during the last several weeks as the Republican bill was discussed. We’re disappointed that the discussion draft turns its back on this simple solution, and goes with something far too familiar: throwing money at the problem.”

Johnson was joined in his opposition to the bill last week by Senators Ted Cruz, R-Texas, Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Rand Paul, R-Ky. All have said they are open to voting for the BCRA if certain improvements are made. In an interview with ABC’s “This Week,” Sen. Paul said that he would “consider partial repeal” if the Senate were to reach an “impasse.” Senator Cruz has offered an amendment to permit insurers to sell plans that are not compliant with Obamacare regulations, in an effort to allow insurance companies to give greater choice to consumers and drive down prices.

Senator Lee has made his vote conditional on an “opt-out provision,” acknowledging that other attempts at compromise from his position of full repeal have failed to move the liberal Republicans in the Senate.

“Conservatives have compromised on not repealing, on spending levels, tax credits, subsidies, corporate bailouts, Medicaid, and the Obamacare regulations. That is, on every substantive question in the bill,” Lee wrote Friday. “Having conceded to my moderate colleagues on all of the above, I now ask only that the bill be amended to include an opt-out provision, for states or even just for individuals.”

The liberal Republicans are wavering on the bill for vastly different reasons. Senator Dean Heller, R-Nev., declared his opposition to the bill during a press conference Friday, saying, “This bill would mean a loss of coverage for millions of Americans, and many Nevadans.” The contentious issue for these Republicans are worries that rolling back Medicaid expansion will cause some Americans to lose their insurance coverage as an entitlement is taken away. Senators Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Bill Cassidy, R-La., are among the moderates expressing concerns.

Senator Susan Collins, R-Maine, is waiting for the Congressional Budget Office score of the bill before making a final decision. ‘‘I have very serious concerns about the bill,’’ she said on ABC’s ‘‘This Week,’’ acknowledging that the CBO score ‘‘will be so important.’’ The CBO is expected to release its score of the Senate bill later today.

In the same interview, Sen. Collins objected to defunding Planned Parenthood in the BCRA, saying, “It makes absolutely no sense to eliminate federal funding for Planned Parenthood.” The bill would block Medicaid reimbursements to Planned Parenthood for one year. Eliminating that provision would further alienate conservative senators who have made defunding Planned Parenthood a condition of their support. Taking the provision out will alienate Sen. Collins and other liberals.

As these battles play out, other senators remain undecided or silent. Still others don’t know what to think. Senator Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, is polling her constituents for their thoughts before taking an official position.

The bottom line is that intense negotiations on this bill will dominate the work of the U.S. Senate this week. The CBO score will complicate the matter. In all likelihood, the CBO will project that millions of Americans will lose their current health insurance coverage, just as it predicted (somewhat inaccurately) would happen in the House American Health Care Act. (For more from the author of “With Senators Like These, Obamacare Repeal Was Always a Tease” please click HERE)

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Feds Break Silence, Try to Explain Why They Didn’t Notify Victims in Secret Non-Prosecution Deal With Child Sex Offender Jeffery Epstein

Federal prosecutors went on the offensive this month, denying allegations that they bowed to pressure from billionaire Palm Beach resident Jeffrey Epstein and his high-priced lawyers at the expense of dozens of teenage girls he sexually abused.

In their first public comment since 2007 — when they negotiated a deal that allowed Epstein to escape federal charges — prosecutors filed hundreds of pages of documents in U.S. District Court, explaining what led to the now infamous non-prosecution agreement that has been decried as “a sweetheart deal.”

Contrary to claims by attorneys representing two of Epstein’s victims in a lawsuit against the federal government, Assistant U.S. Attorney Marie Villafana said she and her superiors were trying to help the traumatized young women when they agreed to let Epstein plead guilty to state prostitution charges.

The now-64-year-old money manager, who spends most of his time on his estate in the Virgin Islands, served 13 months of an 18-month sentence in the Palm Beach County Stockade. He was allowed to leave each day to go to work. . .

In their [pending] lawsuit, the victims’ attorneys, Bradley Edwards and Paul Cassell, say [one of the released documents] is evidence of their claim that prosecutors lied to the victims. They also claim that prosecutors never told Epstein’s victims about the plea deal. (Read more from “Feds Break Silence, Try to Explain Why They Didn’t Notify Victims in Secret Non-Prosecution Deal Child Sex Offender Jeffery Epstein” HERE)

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“If We Knew He Would Win, We Would Have Stopped Him”

This was the comment made by the lead reporter covering Joe Miller and his upstart race for senate, for the then little known, and financially unviable Alaska Dispatch, the night of the primary when Miller pulled off the biggest upset in the history of Alaskan politics, in Trumpian style, back in 2010.

The power, and sheer hubris of the media – had never been more on display – for those attuned to it, than in that race. To be clear- All the powers that be, the media, the left, the establishment GOP, the “deep state” – as it’s now referred to (those sitting in the bureaucracy taking an active hand against a populist or independent minded candidate), all had been taken off guard, and reacted with the full might of their power, doing all they could to sink his campaign in the general election. And, with some help from his own missteps and those of his well meaning staff of honest novices-none of whom, admittedly, had ever been on such a stage, against such seasoned foes- it worked.

It is fair to say, never had Alaskan politics experienced such an upset- and never had that upset been followed by such an assault, from all quarters. Page one lies, followed a week later by page seven retractions. Over an 8 week period of the general election, a count was done of the published articles on each candidate; 26 negative on Miller, 3 on McAdams (the Democrat) and 5, all favorable, on Murkowski, running as a write-in. The myriad of laws broken by state and federal election officials, the slanders by the media, and the betrayals by the party whose primary he won, are legion – too many to list here – but needless to say, the fix was in, and it was heaped on all sides, by all sides.

Fast forward 6 years – and on a much grander stage – a similar event takes place. An unprecedented and more importantly, unpredicted win takes place, and the pillars of power shake.

The response was immediate. The strategy predictable: discredit the win, disavow the mandate.

Never, in the recorded history of our national political scene, has the media, the left wing, the establishment right, and the “deep state” lifelong bureaucrats, all coordinated such a prolonged attack against a sitting president, over.. in realty, nothing..and yet, in a battle, essentially for everything. Make no mistake, the country’s soul is what is up for grabs, and if you do not think so, please take a moment to consider the stage that is set, and where we find ourselves.

A concocted narrative, with no facts, no evidence, and no proof, has dominated the last 8 months of American politics, and is all but insuring the failing of a legislative and executive agenda, which puts as it’s primarily goals, restoring peace and security to the nation and its peoples, and returning freedom and prosperity to the American body, and the individuals of which it’s made, as it’s central goals.

And that, is exactly the problem.

And that, is exactly the point.

The powers that be, on all sides, may not be “colluding” as is the new en vogue phraseology- but they all may as well be. They have a common goal, status quo- and thus- a common enemy: the President. More importantly – his agenda – but there’s more to it than that. A visceral hate, on all sides, because he is beholden to none of them, and this is key; none of them ordained him. In essence- his affront to their sensibilities is three-fold; his goals are in opposition to theirs (no matter what they say in the GOP), they did not create him, thus they cannot control him, and thirdly- they did not predict him, thus he disapproves their all knowing omnipotence.

The last, is the greatest sin.

You can never underestimate the sheer insult it is to the ruling class, when someone they don’t own, and didn’t create, beats their expectations. By extension their lackeys and sycophants in the media and academia are likewise injured, after all- they are the keepers of knowledge and the “knowers of all that is and shall be”, far be it from any citizen, be he small town judge, father of eight and decorated veteran, or billionaire New York real estate magnate and pop culture icon. If they don’t approve you, you don’t get in. If they don’t control you, you don’t get to make decisions. And most importantly – if your basic existence refutes the premise that they know all..

..you must be destroyed.

It’s that simple.

As we watch good men, like former Senator and now Attorney General Jeff Session, get drug thru the mud and have to defend baseless accusations that he should not be subject to…as we watch a media hate cycle feed itself it’s own stories 24 hours a day seven days a week…as we watch craven political operatives and elected politicians shiver with fear in the corner of inaction and cowardice- we may ask ourselves “Why?” And “How did this come to be?” To be be frank, the answer is really not that hard to discern.

For certain, there is money, lots of money at stake. Power, mainline power, the kind that money can’t buy- that is there, to be sure, all of that as well..and all of that has contributed to the decline of nobility of service and replaced it with the utter sleaziness of “job security”, but if you want to know what is really driving all of this, in a word, it is simply this:

Arrogance.

Not just any arrogance.

The kind of arrogance that believes a story shouldn’t be a story unless it was thought of or predicted in the minds of the journalists writing it weeks, months or years before.

The kind of arrogance that thinks the citizen works for the government, and not the other way around.

The kind of arrogance that thinks the powers that be should brook no insolence from the serfs and slaves that tend the fields.

And finally, the kind of arrogance that corrupts a man when he wakes up one day and thinks, not only does he know better than his neighbor how his neighbor should live his life, but that he should be entitled to compel his neighbor- thru force- to live his life accordingly.

At best, this arrogance is giving in to a weakness in all men and women- a failure to discipline oneself against base instincts and poor character temptation that tests us all– at worst, it is the embodiment of evil, and a desire to control ones fellow man, and see them all as merely extras, in the grand Play of ones life, to be moved about to for purposes other than their own, and not deserving of power over their own lives, instead of individuals, with thoughts and opinions and hopes and dreams, and as the only true masters over their own destinies.

It is this arrogance that we are, those of us who hold these beliefs the founders annunciated so well, have been fighting for for centuries. It is this arrogance that we confront now, in the face of the farce that are these hearings and investigations, innuendos and insults, and the attack on our intelligence that is the daily media and pop culture assault, on anyone who dare challenge this arrogance, and those who hold to its self centered axiom, and it is why we must continue to persevere.

This is the world when they have no true power. Full of lies, rumor, slurs, defamation, and character assassination. They are losing right now, thru the grace of God alone.

Imagine the world in which they win?

In the midst of all this, now more than ever, we cannot waiver. We cannot relinquish our freedom and our intellect. We cannot fail to resist. We cannot afford to lose.

______________________________________________

Dr Walter Campbell is a lifelong Alaskan, former Marine, and physician.

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Pat Buchanan: Are We Nearing Civil War?

President Trump may be chief of state, head of government and commander in chief, but his administration is shot through with disloyalists plotting to bring him down.

We are approaching something of a civil war where the capital city seeks the overthrow of the sovereign and its own restoration.

Thus far, it is a nonviolent struggle, though street clashes between pro- and anti-Trump forces are increasingly marked by fistfights and brawls. Police are having difficulty keeping people apart. A few have been arrested carrying concealed weapons . . .

Last week, fired Director of the FBI James Comey, a successor to J. Edgar Hoover, admitted under oath that he used a cutout to leak to The New York Times an Oval Office conversation with the president.

Goal: have the Times story trigger the appointment of a special prosecutor to bring down the president. (Read more from “Are We Nearing Civil War?” HERE)

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Illegal Aliens Offered Free Tuition at Georgia’s Freedom University

A Georgia university provides illegal immigrant students tuition-free education as well as scholarship aid and skills for leading social movements.

Freedom University in Athens, Georgia, an unaccredited school founded in 2011 by illegal immigrant students, activists, and four University of Georgia professors, provides these services and others specifically to illegal immigrant students with the goal of helping them enroll in accredited colleges.

The school lists its mission as “to empower undocumented youth and fulfill their human right to education.” Billing itself as a “freedom school,” Freedom University claims to have assumed a “leadership role in the national sanctuary campus movement.”

Freedom University has also facilitated the development of Mass Emergency Lookout Text for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (MELT ICE), a program which notifies illegal immigrant students when ICE agents are in the vicinity, according to Campus Reform.

“We believe that all human beings – regardless of race, ethnicity, class, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or citizenship status – have a right to education,” states the university on its website. “We uphold Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which states that everyone has the right to education and that higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit.” (Read more from “Illegal Aliens Offered Free Tuition at Georgia’s Freedom University” HERE)

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