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Justice Department Launches Probe of Uvalde Police’s Botched Response to School Shooting

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The Department of Justice announced Sunday it will probe the botched response by Uvalde, Texas, police to Tuesday’s school shooting that left 19 children and two teachers dead.

The investigation was requested by Uvalde Mayor Don McLaughlin amid growing evidence that local police hesitated to go into the Robb Elementary School classroom as the 18-year-old gunman carried out the massacre. Local police have been unable to explain why they waited up to 90 minutes to storm the school.

“The goal of the review is to provide an independent account of law enforcement actions and responses that day, and to identify lessons learned and best practices to help first responders prepare for and respond to active shooter events,” said DOJ spokesman spokesman Anthony Coley. “The review will be conducted with the Department’s Office of Community Oriented Policing.

“As with prior Justice Department after-action reviews of mass shootings and other critical incidents, this assessment will be fair, transparent, and independent. The Justice Department will publish a report with its findings at the conclusion of its review.” (Read more from “Justice Department Launches Probe of Uvalde Police’s Botched Response to School Shooting” HERE)

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Judge Blasts Justice Department for False Account of Kamala Harris’ Whereabouts on January 6

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A D.C. District Court judge overseeing numerous Capitol protest cases today accused the Justice Department of repeatedly falsifying the location of Vice President-elect Kamala Harris during the afternoon of January 6, 2021.

Judge Trevor McFadden, a Trump appointee, openly doubted the validity of trespassing charges against Nicholas Rodean, indicted last March on several counts for his participation in the protest on Capitol Hill.

Rodean, like hundreds of Americans ensnared in the Biden regime’s abusive investigation into the four-hour disturbance, has been charged with three misdemeanors based on the Justice Department’s claim that the U.S. Capitol was “restricted” due to the presence of Secret Service protectees—Harris and Vice President Mike Pence—when protesters entered the building. As I wrote here last week, prosecutors have included the allegation about Harris’ whereabouts in criminal complaints and formal indictments, which means the Justice Department also presented it as evidence to a grand jury.

But Harris was not in the building that day. News reports confirm Harris was at the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee, just east of the Capitol building, one of two locations where law enforcement located alleged “pipe bombs” right before the first breach occured. The Justice Department quietly changed the language in superseding indictments for many January 6 defendants, but apparently did not do so in Rodean’s case.

In a blistering order filed today, McFadden told prosecutors that “the government has a big problem,” noting that Rodean’s indictment still contained the Justice Department’s original claims about Harris. “The superseding indictment says that then Vice President-elect Harris was at the Capitol when Rodean entered it. She was not,” McFadden wrote. “News outlets reported this mere days after January 6.” (Read more from “Judge Blasts Justice Department for False Account of Kamala Harris’ Whereabouts on January 6” HERE)

Photo credit: Flickr

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Durham Filing Rebuts Inspector General Horowitz’s Claims on Missing Cellphones, Hints at Growing Rift

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A supplemental court filing by special counsel John Durham confirms previous reporting that Department of Justice (DOJ) Inspector General Michael Horowitz concealed crucial information from Durham in connection with two separate investigations—the ongoing prosecution of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann and the criminal leak investigation of former FBI General Counsel James Baker.

The Jan. 28 filing by Durham updated the court on precisely when Durham first learned of two cellphones that had been used by Baker while he was with the FBI. The existence of these phones was first mentioned in a Jan. 25 filing, in which Durham claimed that the Inspector General’s Office (OIG) had failed to disclose its possession of two FBI cellphones belonging to Baker.

Following the Jan. 25 filing, Horowitz’s office apparently told Durham that the existence of one of the cellphones may have been mentioned on a conference call that took place four years ago.

“The OIG Special Agent had a conference call with members of the investigative team, including Mr. Durham, during which the cellphones likely were discussed,” reads the Jan. 28 court filing.

However, Durham states in the filing that he not only doesn’t recall the conference call, but also that he had no knowledge of Horowitz’s possession of Baker’s cellphones before being informed of their existence by a separate investigative team within the FBI on Jan. 6. (Read more from “Durham Filing Rebuts Inspector General Horowitz’s Claims on Missing Cellphones, Hints at Growing Rift” HERE)

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DOJ Raises Stakes With Rarely Used Sedition Charges for These Jan 6 Protesters

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The seditious conspiracy charges brought by the Justice Department on Thursday against the leader of the Oath Keepers and other members of the right-wing group signal the government is prepared to take on an ambitious fight to show that they joined the Jan. 6, 2021, attack as part of a coordinated effort to deny President Biden the White House.

The indictment contains the first sedition charges that have been brought following the riot and mark a significant escalation in prosecutors’ efforts by drawing a connection between the physical acts of mayhem that day and the broader effort by former President Trump’s supporters to obstruct Biden from taking office.

The arrest of Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the far-right militia group, followed criticism that the Justice Department, despite filing hundreds of charges, was failing to go after major actors behind the attack.

The criminal statute for seditious conspiracy covers plots to overthrow or attack the government or use force to prevent the execution of U.S. laws. The Justice Department’s case against the leaders of the Oath Keepers alleges that they conspired “to oppose by force the execution of the laws governing the transfer of presidential power.”

“It’s ​​significant because they are so rarely used, and that reflects the gravity of the charges and the difficulties of proving it in court,” said Bruce Hoffman, a counterterrorism and homeland security expert with the Council on Foreign Relations. (Read more from “DOJ Raises Stakes With Rarely Used Sedition Charges for These Jan 6 Protesters” HERE)

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DOJ Files Emergency Motion to Block Pro-Life Texas Law

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The Justice Department took action late Tuesday against the controversial Texas abortion law, asking a federal court to immediately stop enforcement of the law while the legality of the law remains in limbo.

The law, known as S.B. 8, bans abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected in an unborn baby, which happens around six weeks into pregnancy. What is unique about the law is that it relies on civil, not criminal, enforcement.

The Supreme Court declined to block the law earlier this month in a 5-4 decision; Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the court’s liberal minority. The court, however, did not make a determination about the constitutionality of the law. . .

In an emergency motion filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas in Austin, the Justice Department asked a federal judge to temporarily or preliminarily prevent the enforcement of S.B. 8.

The scope of the DOJ’s argument is that S.B. 8 violates the Constitution — specifically the 14th Amendment and Supremacy Clause — and that the federal government “has the authority and responsibility to ensure that Texas cannot insulate itself from judicial review for its constitutional violations and to protect the important federal interests that S.B. 8 impairs.” (Read more from “DOJ Files Emergency Notion to Block Pro-Life Texas Law” HERE)

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Justice Department Sues Texas Over Pro-Life Law

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The Justice Department is suing Texas over the state’s new controversial restrictions on abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Thursday.

Garland said the law is plainly improper both for its onerous restrictions on abortion access and for the provisions allowing state residents to sue anyone who aids or carries out restricted abortions.

“The act is clearly unconstitutional under longstanding Supreme Court precedent,” Garland said at a press conference.

“This kind of scheme to nullify the Constitution of the United States is one that all Americans, whatever their politics or party, should fear,” Garland said.

“If it prevails, it may become a model for action in other areas by other states and with respect to other constitutional rights and judicial precedents. nor need one think long or hard to realize the damage that would be done to our society if states were allowed to implement laws that empower any private individual to infringe on another’s constitutionally protected rights in this way,” he added. (Read more from “Justice Department Sues Texas Over Pro-Life Law” HERE)

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DOJ Investigation: Yale Discriminated Against Whites, Asians in Admissions

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On Thursday the Department of Justice (DOJ) determined Yale University illegally discriminated against white and Asian people. The conclusion is the result of a two-year investigation into the school’s undergraduate admissions practices in response to a complaint by Asian American groups.

Its multi-year probe found Yale violated Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act barring discrimination by using race as a “determinative factor in hundreds of admissions decisions each year,” according to the DOJ press release. “For the great majority of applicants, Asian Americans and whites have only one-tenth to one-fourth of the likelihood of admission as African American applicants with comparable academic credentials. Yale rejects scores of Asian American and white applicants each year based on their race, whom it otherwise would admit.” . . .

The Justice Department explained that while the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled universities raking in federal dollars may consider applicants’ race, academic institutions must consider it as one of many factors. Yet prosecutors determined Yale “uses race at multiple steps of its admissions process resulting in a multiplied effect.” (Read more from “DOJ Investigation: Yale Discriminated Against Whites, Asians in Admissions” HERE)

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Here’s How Much the NFL Rakes in From Taxpayers

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The Department of Justice announced Thursday it has filed a lawsuit against a Colorado corporation for allegedly discriminating against U.S. workers.

The complaint alleges that in 2016, Crop Production discriminated against at least three United States citizens by refusing to employ them as seasonal technicians in El Campo, Texas, because Crop Production preferred to hire temporary foreign workers under the H-2A visa program.

“In the spirit of President Trump’s Executive Order on Buy American and Hire American, the Department of Justice will not tolerate employers who discriminate against U.S. workers because of a desire to hire temporary foreign visa holders,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement. “… Where there is a job available, U.S. workers should have a chance at it before we bring in workers from abroad.”

The problem is rampant.

One report on Watchdog.org said that over the past two decades, the NFL has raked in about $7 billion of taxpayer money to spend on stadium renovation and building.

Another study from the Brookings Institution showed that federal taxpayers have subsidized the construction of 36 stadiums at a cost of over $3.2 billion since 2000.

Michael Sargent, an infrastructure expert at The Heritage Foundation, wrote about how sports teams use specially crafted tax breaks to get the public to finance their massive projects.

“Tax-exempt municipal bonds are typically reserved for public-use projects such as bridges, water systems, and other infrastructure,” Sargent wrote for The Daily Signal. “Yet because of a loophole in the tax code, private-use stadiums can take advantage of this tax break, and have done so prolifically.”

In fact, only a handful of NFL and other major league teams use privately-financed venues to host their games.

It would seem after sinking enormous investments into sports franchises, cities would reap serious financial benefits in return.

But this isn’t the case at all.

Research from George Mason University has shown that not only do communities gain almost no economic benefits from subsidized sports teams, but some findings “indicate harmful effects of sports on per capita income, wage and salary disbursements, and wages per job.”

Recently released polls show national anthem protests are deeply unpopular with the American people, but polls also show that the taxpayer funding of sports is also widely disliked.

When likely voters in Nevada were asked if they favored or opposed using $500 million in taxpayer dollars to fund a stadium for the Oakland Raiders to move to Las Vegas, they overwhelmingly said “no.”

According to the KTNV-TV 13 Action News/Rasmussen Reports poll, 60 percent of Nevada voters opposed the funding, and only 28 percent supported it.

Given the massive discontent over national anthem kneeling and rampant politicization of the once unifying sport of football, perhaps now Americans will turn a more skeptical eye toward how their sports teams rely on public money and actually do something about it.

There are some in Congress who have taken notice.

“In America, if you want to play sports, you’re free to do so. If you want to protest, you’re free to do so,” Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., said in a Tuesday speech, according to The Washington Post. “But you should do so on your own time and on your own dime.”

Recent bipartisan legislation on Capitol Hill aimed to strip federal funding from sports teams. A bill sponsored by Sens. James Lankford, R-Okla., and Cory Booker, D-N.J., would prevent teams from using municipal bonds that are exempt from federal taxes.

Rep. Steve Russell, R-Okla., introduced a similar bill in the House.

Lankford said in a statement in June:

The federal government is responsible for a lot of important functions, but financing sports stadiums for multimillion—sometimes billion—dollar franchises is definitely not one of them. Using billions of federal taxpayer dollars for the subsidization of private stadiums when we have real infrastructure needs in our country is not a good way to prioritize a limited amount of funds.

This movement has picked up steam in recent weeks, according to Kerry Picket of The Daily Caller.

On Tuesday, Gaetz became the lead sponsor of legislation that would end the tax-exempt status of professional sports leagues.

NFL and other sports teams have a deep financial interest in getting taxpayers to pay their bills, so it will take a widespread concerted effort on the part of the public to end this gravy train.

Since NFL billionaire owners have gone out of their way to accommodate millionaire players in standing down for the national anthem, perhaps taxpaying Americans should start withholding money from the privileged and let them all stand on their own two feet.

Now may be the perfect time to finally do it. (For more from the author of “Here’s How Much the NFL Rakes in From Taxpayers” please click HERE)

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Appeals Panel Overturns Ruling Allowing DOJ to Withhold Fast and Furious Docs

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A three-judge federal appeals panel in Washington has overturned a lower court ruling that allowed the Department of Justice (DOJ) to withhold documents from the public regarding its Fast and Furious gun-running scandal.

Senior Circuit Judge Douglas Ginsburg, who wrote the February 12 ruling, cited a prior case which found that “the test for determining whether an agency has improperly withheld records placed under seal by a court is ‘whether the seal, like an injunction, prohibits the agency from disclosing the records’.”

But “the government has not carried its burden in this case,” Ginsburg concluded.

However, Friday’s appellate ruling does not order the immediate release of the Fast and Furious documents which Judicial Watch had requested under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). It merely sends the case back to the lower court for clarification.

In Operation Fast and Furious, Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents in Phoenix allowed drug cartel “straw purchasers” to buy more than 2,000 firearms in the U.S. and smuggle them over the border into Mexico, including two AK-47s used to murder U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry in 2010. (Read more from “Appeals Panel Overturns Ruling Allowing DOJ to Withhold Fast and Furious Docs” HERE)

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Eric Holder: Department of Justice ‘Prepared’ to Dismantle Ferguson Police Department If Necessary

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Attorney General Eric Holder said the Department of Justice could go as far as dismantling the Ferguson Police Department to ensure change after the DOJ report that found it discriminated against blacks in the Missouri city.

“We are prepared to use all the powers that we have, all the power that we have to ensure that the situation changes there and that means everything from working with them to you know coming up with an entirely new structure,” Holder told reporters on the tarmac of Andrews Air Force Base today.

Asked if that includes dismantling the police department, Holder said, “If that’s what’s necessary, we’re prepared to do that” . . .

“What we saw was that Ferguson police department in conjunction with municipality saw traffic stops, arrests, and tickets as revenue generators as opposed to serving,” the president said at a town hall at Benedict College in Columbia, S.C. The president added the overwhelmingly white force was “systematically” biased, placing minorities under its care into an “oppressive and abusive situation.” (Read more about the Department of Justice being prepared to dismantle the Ferguson police department HERE)

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