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Former Obama Aide Now a Person of Interest in Unmasking Investigation

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Former Obama White House National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes is now an emerging as a person of interest in the House Intelligence Committee’s unmasking investigation, according to a letter sent Tuesday by the committee to the National Security Agency (NSA). This adds Rhodes to the growing list of top Obama government officials who may have improperly unmasked Americans in communications intercepted overseas by the NSA, Circa has confirmed.

The House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes, R-CA, sent the letter to the National Security Agency requesting the number of unmaskings made by Rhodes from Jan. 1, 2016 to Jan. 20, 2017, according to congressional sources who spoke with Circa. Rhodes, who worked closely with former National Security Adviser Susan Rice and was a former deputy national security adviser for strategic communications for President Obama, became a focus of the committee during its review of classified information to assess whether laws were broken regarding NSA intercepted communications of President Trump, members of his administration and other Americans before and after the election, according to congressional officials. The committee is requesting that the NSA deliver the information on Rhodes by August, 21.

Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, Rice and former CIA Director John Brennan have all been named in the House Intelligence Committee’s investigation into the unmasking of Americans. A letter sent last week from Nunes to Dan Coats, the director of National Intelligence, suggested that top Obama aides made hundreds of unmasking requests during the 2016 presidential elections. The story, which was first reported by The Hill last week, stated that the requests were made without specific justifications as to why the unmasking was necessary. Rice and Brennan have confirmed they sought the unredacted names of Americans in NSA-sourced intelligence reports but insisted their requests were routine parts of their work and had no nefarious intentions. Power also has legal authority to unmask officials, though the practice has not reportedly been common for someone in her position. Rhodes also had legal authority to unmask Americans in NSA-source intelligence reports. But intelligence and congressional sources question the extent of the unmasking. (Read more from “Former Obama Aide Now a Person of Interest in Unmasking Investigation” HERE)

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Bible Studies at the White House: Who’s Inside This Spiritual Awakening?

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. . .Some of the most powerful people in America have been gathering weekly to learn more about God’s Word, and this Trump Cabinet Bible study is making history . . .

Ralph Drollinger of Capitol Ministries told CBN News, “These are godly individuals that God has risen to a position of prominence in our culture” . . .

Drollinger is a former NBA-playing giant of a man with an even bigger calling. He founded Capitol Ministries with the idea that if you change the hearts of lawmakers, then their Christian world view will guide them to make good policies.

He’s started Bible studies in 40 state capitols, a number of foreign capitols, teaches weekly studies in the U.S. House and Senate and now leads about a dozen members of President Trump’s Cabinet in weekly studies of the scriptures.

Health Secretary Tom Price, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, Agriculture Secretary Sunny Perdue, and CIA Director Mike Pompeo are just a few of the regulars. (Read more from “Bible Studies at the White House: Who’s Inside This Spiritual Awakening?” HERE)

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Scaramucci Leaks His Scorched-Earth Plan for Leakers

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. . .The New Yorker’s Washington correspondent Ryan Lizza claims Scaramucci, whose name appropriately translates as “skirmish,” called him Wednesday night ostensibly to grill him about his sources for Lizza’s Tweet about a dinner meeting at the White House between President Trump, the first lady, Sean Hannity and former Fox News executive Bill Shine.

“Was Trump getting strategic advice from Hannity?” Lizza asked. “Was he considering hiring Shine?”

“Who leaked that to you?” Scaramucci asked. According to the New Yorker account, Lizza said he couldn’t give up that information. To which Scaramucci threatened to fire the entire communications staff.

“What I’m going to do is, I will eliminate everyone in the comms team and we’ll start over,” Scaramucci is quoted as saying. “I ask these guys not to leak anything and they can’t help themselves. You’re an American citizen, this is a major catastrophe for the American country. So, I’m asking you as an American patriot to give me a sense of who leaked it.”

Scaramucci is obsessed with leaks. And he makes no bones about resorting to a scorched-earth approach to outing leakers and firing them. (Read more from “Scaramucci Leaks His Scorched-Earth Plan for Leakers” HERE)

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White House Panel on Voter Fraud Begins Work

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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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‘None of This Happened’: White House, Pentagon Call Trump ISIS Story Into Question

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The White House did not ask defense officials to help come up with ideas to brand the Trump administration’s anti-ISIS efforts differently from the Obama administration, Senior Pentagon and White House officials told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

“The White House has asked defense officials to come up with new ideas to help brand the Trump campaign as different from its predecessor,” The Daily Beast reported Wednesday, citing two defense officials and a senior administration official.

“None of this happened,” a senior White House official told TheDCNF, vehemently denying the report.

“I’m not familiar with any such effort,” Pentagon Spokesman Navy Capt. Jeff Davis similarly told TheDCNF. The senior White House official further corroborated Davis’ denial, referencing discussions with National Security Council officials. (Read more from “‘None of This Happened’: White House, Pentagon Call Trump ISIS Story Into Question” HERE)

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TRUMP WARNS ASSAD: White House Says Syria Potentially Prepping Another Chemical Attack

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The Trump administration said late Monday that it had discovered evidence that the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad could be planning another chemical weapons attack.

Press Secretary Sean Spicer said in a statement that “The United States has identified potential preparations for another chemical weapons attack by the Assad regime that would likely result in the mass murder of civilians, including innocent children.”

Spicer added that the activities resembled preparations for an April chemical weapons attack that was blamed on Damascus.

“As we have previously stated, the United States is in Syria to eliminate the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria,” Spicer concluded. “If, however, Mr. Assad conducts another mass murder attack using chemical weapons, he and his military will pay a heavy price.”

The White House did not detail what prompted the warning. Several State Department officials typically involved in coordinating such announcements told the Associated Press they were caught completely off guard by the warning, which didn’t appear to be discussed in advance with other national security agencies. (Read more from “TRUMP WARNS ASSAD: White House Says Syria Potentially Prepping Another Chemical Attack” HERE)

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White House Pushes Trump Priorities Before Congressional Recess

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As some Republicans in Congress are calling on leadership to allow the legislative branch to work through the August recess, the White House touted President Donald Trump’s priorities that Congress should move on.

White House press secretary Sean Spicer deferred to congressional leadership on scheduling, in response to a question from The Daily Signal about scrapping or shortening the August recess.

“That’s going to be up to the House and the Senate to determine their recess,” Spicer told The Daily Signal during a press briefing Tuesday. “Generally, we don’t get involved in their schedule. I’ll let Speaker [Paul] Ryan and Leader [Mitch] McConnell decide what’s appropriate.”

The Daily Signal followed by asking Spicer if Trump is satisfied with the pace of Congress on issues such as repealing Obamacare and tax reform.

“If we continue to move forward with health care, the way we’ve been told we’re going to, I think we’re great,” Spicer said. “We’ve got our priorities. We want to get health care done. We want to get tax reform done. And obviously, the president has spoken very extensively about infrastructure. If we can get those done, I think we feel really good.”

Pressed further on a timeline, Spicer said, “We’ll go as quick as Congress wants.”

“That’s a little out of our hands. But it’s—as soon as Congress can do it, we’ll do what we can,” Spicer said. “When the House had its bill up, the president worked feverishly to make sure that he did everything he could to get it over the finish line. I think we’ll do the same for all those other scenarios as well.”

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows, R-N.C., and the caucus support working through the August recess.

Also, Republican Sens. David Perdue of Georgia, Dan Sullivan of Alaska, and Steve Daines of Montana have called on McConnell to keep the Senate in session, The Hill reported. (For more from the author of “White House Pushes Trump Priorities Before Congressional Recess” please click HERE)

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White House: ‘There Is Still No Evidence of Any Russia-Trump Campaign Collusion’

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The White House said testimonies from former C.I.A. Director John Brennan and Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats back up the administration’s claim that there was no collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian government.

“This morning’s hearings back up what we’ve been saying all along,” a White House spokesman said in a statement Tuesday. “That despite a year of investigation, there is still no evidence of any Russia-Trump campaign collusion, that the president never jeopardized intelligence sources or sharing, and that even Obama’s CIA Director believes the leaks of classified information are ‘appalling’ and the culprits must be ‘tracked down.’”

As he testified before the House Intelligence Committee, Brennan said he was “aware of information and intelligence that revealed contacts and interactions between Russian officials and U.S. persons involved in the Trump campaign.” They concerned him “because of known Russian efforts to suborn such individuals.”

Though he said “seeing these types of contacts during the same period of time raised my concern,” Brennan noted that the “contacts might’ve been totally, totally innocent and benign as well as those that might have succumbed somehow to those Russian efforts.”

Meanwhile, Coats dodged when he was asked about a report that claimed Donald Trump asked both he and National Security Agency Director Mike Rogers to publicly state that he was not under investigation for colluding with the Russian government. (Read more from “White House: ‘There Is Still No Evidence of Any Russia-Trump Campaign Collusion'” HERE)

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White House Staff Around Trump STILL Don’t Get Islamic Threat

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Well, it appears that another campaign promise bit the dust. The Jerusalem embassy move went the way of repealing Obamacare, rescinding Obama’s amnesty, building the wall, undoing the Paris climate accord and Iran nuclear deal, and protecting religious liberty. All for the purpose of preserving the PLO peace process — because nothing says “drain the swamp,” understanding Islam, and “America-first” like the Oslo peace process.

The collapse of this White House administration’s foreign policy under the leadership of National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster stems from one source: the refusal to recognize the insufferable nature of unreformed Islam.

Throughout the presidential election, both President Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, consistently hit Obama and Hillary for refusing to even name the enemy and recognize its threat doctrine. After all, if you refuse to identify who the enemy is, how can you place our soldiers in harm’s way, craft diplomatic relationships, and strategize any outcome in the Middle East?

Donald Trump clearly recognized this point in a seminal foreign policy speech he delivered on Sept. 7, 2016, when he declared, “We now have an administration, and a former secretary of state, who refuse to say ‘Radical Islamic Terrorism.’”

Promising a realist approach recognizing the Middle East and Islam as it exists — and not as we want it to exist — Trump delivered somewhat of a doctrine that night in Philadelphia, which clearly resonated with many of the voters that propelled him to the Oval Office: “In a Trump administration, our actions in the Middle East will be tempered by realism. The current strategy of toppling regimes, with no plan for what to do the day after, only produces power vacuums that are filled by terrorists.”

Trump further promised that a new moral clarity will help us “make new friends, rebuild old alliances, and bring new allies into the fold.”

The recognition that radical Islamists are the source of the problem is what dictates immigration policy, decisions over military action, the so-called “Israeli-Palestinian” conflicts, and our views toward Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and the Muslim Brotherhood. The expectation of many supporters of this president were that he’d move us in the opposite direction of the Obama administration on all aforementioned fronts.

In comes H.R. McMaster, who refuses to even recognize the enemy by adamantly declining to even talk about radical Islamic terrorism, which in itself, “terrorism” is somewhat of a euphemism for the problems endemic in sharia-adherence. Everything else has gone downhill from there, and it was on full display Tuesday.

The consequences of willful blindness on the Islamic threat is the source of McMaster’s desire to get us further entrenched in Syria and Afghanistan, bring in more refugees, kowtow to the Muslim Brotherhood, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Turkey, and throw Israel under the bus. After all, if we are walking on eggshells in the Arab world with our troops strung out precariously throughout the various theaters refereeing Islamic civil wars, we wouldn’t want our support for Israel to harm them.

Consider the following observations:

Throwing Israel under the bus: Both McMaster and White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer refused to affirm that even the Western Wall is part of Israel. This echoes Obama’s policies and comes on the heels of the White House refusing to allow Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu to appear with the president at the Western Wall. It further accentuates the growing push within the administration to embrace the PLO. It doesn’t help that the intel Trump leaked to Russian officials was reportedly from Israeli intelligence services.

Embracing Erdogan: In another throwback to Obama’s policies – embracing enemies and alienating allies – Trump hosted Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. This man is an Islamo-fascist and the Sunni equivalent of the Iranian Mullahs. He stands at the nexus of Sunni Islamic supremacism and is an enemy of the American people. Yet, he has been allowed to fund the construction of the largest Islamic Center in the country just outside Washington, D.C. Rep. David Brat, R-Va., has a bill (H.R. 5824) that would prohibit a foreign national of a country that limits the free exercise of religion in that country from making any expenditure in the U.S. promoting a religion. Yet, I doubt Trump’s meeting was about that.

Meanwhile, Erdogan’s bodyguards beat anti-Erdogan protesters outside of the ambassador’s D.C. home … on American soil!

Further involvement in Afghanistan: There is growing momentum within the administration for McMaster’s plan to further entrench us in the Afghanistan quagmire by sending more troops. The 15 years of utter failure in Afghanistan is not President Trump’s fault. But if he doubles down on the failed strategy without either forging a new path or getting out, he will own it just as much. McMaster is continuing the strategy of “placing our brave soldiers into an Islamic civil war first, ask questions about national security interests and strategy later.”

The question is how can we get our soldiers further involved when we don’t even understand the threat doctrine of the enemy?We have nothing to show for our efforts but over 1,800 military deaths, 20,000 wounded, and the Taliban controlling more territory than ever before – all to establish a sharia-compliant government with a constitution (set up by U.S. officials) which fosters the type of Islamic supremacism we are at war with. If this White House administration is going to saddle up to Erdogan and the PLO, why exactly would we send our troops into another Islamic theater to fight for … what?

According to the recent “Worldwide Threat Assessment” presented to the Senate by Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, the “situation in Afghanistan will very likely continue to deteriorate, even if international support is sustained.” The report further notes that “Kabul’spolitical dysfunction and ineffectiveness will almost certainly be the greatest vulnerability to stability in 2017.” Thus, even if we temporarily beat back the Taliban, for whom will we hold the ground without the need for a substantial troops presence forever?

This Trump administration’s Middle East policy will never succeed until it speaks with one clear voice and identifies the nature of our enemy. That will not happen until H.R. McMaster, Dina Powell, Jared and Ivanka Trump are kept out of the decision-making process. (For more from the author of “White House Staff Around Trump STILL Don’t Get Islamic Threat” please click HERE)

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White House Vows Funding for Border Wall, Just Not Now

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Congress plans to pass a final spending bill to keep the government running beyond the next week, but without funding for a border wall. The White House, however, says it will demand money for President Donald Trump’s signature campaign issue in next year’s budget plan.

“The president is committed to having a physical border wall. That is not to be doubted,” Helen Aguirre Ferré, White House media affairs director, told The Daily Signal in an interview Friday, adding:

The funding didn’t have to be at this particular point in time, when we need a continuing resolution when it comes to the budget, but it’s definitely going to be presented by September, when we have to have the budget going forward. I don’t think anybody should doubt that this is something that is going to be pressed on.

The current fiscal year runs through Sept. 30. Congress has not added any funds for that budget year specifically for a wall along the Mexico-U.S. border.

Trump’s proposal for fiscal year 2018, which begins Oct. 1, includes a $1.5 billion down payment on the wall. Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney said in March that another $2.8 billion likely would go into funding the wall the next fiscal year.

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., had threatened a government shutdown if any funding in the spending bill for the current fiscal year goes toward construction of a border wall.

On Friday, the House and Senate passed a measure that keeps the government running for another week while it works on a $1 trillion package to keep the government running through September. Otherwise, the money would have run out at midnight.

The House passed the measure by a vote of 382-30, while the Senate followed with a voice vote. The White House previously had dropped Trump’s demand that some funds for the wall be included in the final spending bill.

“Our biggest concern at this point in time is to do the No. 1 thing that the American public has put on our shoulders—and we signed up for the job, quite frankly—which is to govern. And that means that the government must remain open,” Ferré said.

When asked if the president was willing to risk a government shutdown with Schumer when talks resume in September, Ferré said:

We hope that everybody comes together to the table to really work to resolve our nation’s problems. That includes border security. The president is committed to the border wall. There will be funding for the border wall.

(For more from the author of “White House Vows Funding for Border Wall, Just Not Now” please click HERE)

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