Day: October 17, 2018

Bredesen Not Serious About Meeting with President Trump, Tennessee GOP Leader Says

Jason M. Reynolds

Phil Bredesen can fly his $10 million jet to New York to wine and dine with billionaire gun-control advocate Michael Bloomberg but apparently cannot make the slightly shorter trip to Washington, D.C. to meet with President Donald Trump. So, Bredesen has issued an invitation to the president to visit him next time he travels to Tennessee to campaign for Bredesen’s rival, U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN-07), whom Trump has endorsed. The president attended an Oct. 1 rally to support Blackburn in her run for the U.S. Senate. He also attended a May rally for her. Bredesen on Tuesday tweeted “I’d like to extend an invitation to President Trump — if he comes back to TN to campaign for my opponent— to discuss how we can establish a business relationship with pharma. It’s time for us to put our business hats on and work together to do what’s best for Tennessee.” One problem is that the president has not announced any visits to Tennessee in the immediate future. After Bredesen claimed he wanted to meet with President Trump, Tennessee Republican Party Chairman Scott Golden said: “Trump was very explicit: Democrat Phil Bredesen will ‘100 percent’ vote against the President and the…

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Battle Heats Up Over Issue of Welfare for Immigrants, Billionaire Koch Brothers and Tennessee Immigrant Activists on the Same Side

Anna Marie Bolton

As President Donald Trump continues to push forward with campaign promises to rein in out-of-control immigration, one measure announced in September has the Open Borders activists and some business tycoons up in arms. It is the so-called “public charge” regulatory change published last week in the Federal Register by the US Citizenship and Immigration (ICE) of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Like all new regulations and re-writes, the proposed rules will be open for public comment. The sixty-day comment period ends on December, 10, 2018. Simply, ‘public charge’ is a very old idea that basically says immigrants shouldn’t be coming to America for welfare benefits. The Trump administration, understanding that the US cannot have open borders and a generous welfare state, wants to make it harder for immigrants already here, in some cases benefiting unfairly from taxpayers’ generosity, to move forward with permanent legal status. Even before the official comment period opened some groups announced their opposition. Two Tennessee pro-immigrant advocacy groups are part of a national campaign to stop the administration’s sweeping reforms of refugee and immigrant policy throughout the government. Calling this recent Trump policy tightening “immoral” and “callous,” the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition (TIRRC) and The Tennessee…

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Taylor Swift’s ‘Reputation’ Not Enough to Move Voters in Tennessee Senate Race, Poll Says

Jason M. Reynolds

Taylor Swift’s endorsement of Democrat Phil Bredesen has done little to move the needle in the U.S. Senate race, a new poll by  Cygnal, a Republican polling and research firm shows. Pop superstar Taylor Swift used Instagram recently to endorse Bredesen and U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN-05), The Tennessee Star reported on Oct. 8. The 28-year-old superstar stunned fans by breaking her career-long political silence with her endorsements. Cygnal says Swift’s foray into politics is not having much impact, however, particularly in Bredesen’s race with U.S. Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN-07) for the open Senate seat. The Star reported Saturday that a New York Times poll shows Blackburn with a strong lead of 54 percent to 40 percent over the former governor. While election officials in Tennessee have noted an increase in voter registrations, more than 86 percent of respondents say their vote hasn’t changed, despite 82 percent of respondents indicating they were aware of the endorsement, Cygnal said in a statement. “Millennial and Gen Z voters are highly aware of the endorsement of the Democrat, but it did little to move their vote preference,” said Matt Hubbard, vice president of Research & Analytics at Cygnal. “Swift’s endorsement is providing a…

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Trump Takes Aim at Fusion GPS Founder, DOJ Official Linked to Dossier

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by Chuck Ross   President Donald Trump took aim Tuesday at Glenn Simpson and Bruce Ohr, two central figures in a congressional investigation into the FBI and Department of Justice’s (DOJ) handling of the infamous Steele dossier. In a series of tweets, Trump noted that Simpson, the founder of opposition research firm Fusion GPS, is planning to invoke his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination during a congressional appearance Tuesday. Trump noted Ohr, a DOJ official, provided testimony to Congress in August that directly conflicts with what Simpson told the House Intelligence Committee in November. Ohr told lawmakers Aug. 28 that he met Simpson twice, once in August 2016 and once in December 2016. That conflicts with Simpson’s Nov. 14, 2017, testimony in which he claimed only to have had contact with Ohr after the election. “Conflict between Glen Simpson’s testimony to another House Panel about his contact with Justice Department official Bruce Ohr. Ohr was used by Simpson and Steele as a Back Channel to get (FAKE) Dossier to FBI. Simpson pleading Fifth,” Trump wrote, quoting Fox News’s Catherine Herridge. “Where is Jeff Sessions?” Trump asked, referring to the attorney general. “Conflict between Glen Simpson’s testimony to another House Panel about his…

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Movie ‘Gosnell’ Cracks Top 10 at Box Office

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by Rachel del Guidice   A movie about Kermit Gosnell, the late-term abortionist in Philadelphia who went to prison after being convicted in connection with the deaths of three babies, hit the Top 10 films at the box office over the weekend. “We were [No. 10] on Friday and Saturday, but slipped back to 12 on Sunday,” Phelim McAleer, who co-produced the film with his wife, Ann McElhinney, said in a statement to The Daily Signal. “We are the No. 1 independent movie of the weekend and [No. 5] per screen average across the U.S.” “This has been achieved despite the mainstream media virtually refusing to review the film, despite it opening nationally,” McAleer said. The movie, “Gosnell: The Trial of America’s Biggest Serial Killer,” which opened in theaters Friday, tells the true story of Gosnell and how his 30-plus-year abortion career ended in a case alleging multiple murders. Directed by Nick Searcy, it stars Dean Cain, Earl Billings, and Michael Beach. The film’s reception so far is not at all due to mainstream media coverage, Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the pro-life Susan B. Anthony List, said in a statement provided to The Daily Signal. The box office success of “Gosnell” is…

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In FY2018, the Deficit Increased – But Not Because of Tax Cuts

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by Robert Romano   The numbers for the end of Fiscal Year 2018 are in and they aren’t pretty for fiscal hawks, as the budget deficit increased by an eye-popping $113 billion to $779 billion. But it had nothing to do with tax cuts. Tax receipts rose by $14 billion. All of it was because spending increased, and more than half of it was because gross interest owed on the national debt spiked by $65 billion to $521.5 billion. That bit is unsurprising, as 10-year treasuries interest rates have jumped from 2.2 percent in Sept. 2017 to 3.1 percent today. No wonder President Donald Trump thinks the Federal Reserve is crazy for hiking interest rates. With $21 trillion in debt, for every percentage point interest rates increase, that’s another $210 billion U.S. taxpayers will owe on the debt long-term. The other half of the deficit increase was a jump in spending that was already baked into the cake, largely in areas like Social Security, Medicare and defense spending. What’s amazing is that Social Security and Medicare spending have not been growing faster, considering how rapidly the population 65 years old and older has been expanding, but inflation was much lower…

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Heitkamp Apologizes for Running Ad Naming Alleged Sexual Assault Survivors Without Their Permission

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by Grace Carr   North Dakota Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp apologized Tuesday for publishing a Sunday ad listing alleged sexual assault survivors, a number of whom said they had not given their permission to be in the ad or were not survivors of sexual assault. “I deeply regret this mistake and we are in the process of issuing a retraction, personally apologizing to each of the people impacted by this and taking the necessary steps to ensure this never happens again,” Heitkamp said in a statement, according to The Associated Press. Formulated as an open letter to North Dakota Republican Rep. Kevin Cramer, the ad named a myriad of women as “survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, or rape.” Shortly after the ad appeared, a number of women posted on Facebook that they had not given their consent to be named in the ad. Women named Kady Miller, Keeley Beck, Lexi Zhorela and Eve Lancaster are among those who say they did not give their consent to be listed in the campaign ad. “I definitely want to clarify right away that I am NOT a domestic/sexual assault survivor,” a woman, identifying herself as Miller, told The Daily Caller News Foundation in a message. “I’ve never supported Heitkamp and…

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Heller Pulls Away From Jacky Rosen in Poll as Nevada Senate Race Moves Red

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by Jason Hopkins   New polling shows Republican Nevada Sen. Dean Heller is pulling ahead of his Democratic rival, Jacky Rosen, indicating a sharp turnaround for the incumbent Republican. A new Emerson College Survey released Monday shows Heller with a commanding seven-point lead over Rosen, a liberal congresswoman vying for his seat, 48 percent to 41 percent. The poll of likely voters was conducted from Oct. 10 to 12, with a margin of error of 4.2 percent. The Emerson survey comes nearly a week after an NBC/Marist poll showed Heller ahead of Rosen by only two percentage points. As recently as Oct. 1, a CNN survey found Rosen in the lead by 4 percentage points among likely voters. Heller has now taken the lead in the Real Clear Politics average of recent polls. The latest numbers provide good news for Heller, a first-term Nevada senator who is has been described by many as the most vulnerable Republican running in this midterm cycle. Also, the change in direction provides further evidence of a “Kavanaugh bounce” for Republicans. Numerous GOP candidates have either closed the gap or surpassed their Democratic rivals shortly following the heated battle to place Brett Kavanaugh onto the…

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State House Majority Leader Glen Casada Commentary: Tennessee’s Economic Boom is on the Ballot This November

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by State House Majority Leader Glen Casada (R-Franklin)   It won’t be listed with the candidates’ names this November, but Tennessee’s economic boom will most certainly be on the ballot. Tennesseans have an important choice on Election Day: we can either back Donald Trump’s agenda of economic prosperity or fall for the Democrats’ plans to take it all away with far-left policies that failed us in years past. The choice is clear — and our state’s future economic growth depends on it. Backing the President’s agenda means backing Marsha Blackburn to replace Bob Corker in the U.S. Senate. A vote for Phil Bredesen, her Democrat opponent, is a vote to replace wealth and prosperity with hardship and division. In the past 20 months, thanks to President Trump, Tennessee has seen an unprecedented economic boom, and the state economy is growing at a faster rate than the nation as a whole. Tennessee currently has the lowest state unemployment rate on record, led the nation in small business growth last year, and Tennessee now has the lowest debt per capita of any state in the nation. Nationally, middle-class income hit an all time high, and our GDP growth is higher than the…

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Pelosi Outlines Agenda if Democrats Retake House

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Projecting confidence about her party’s chances, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi outlined five of the top 10 agenda items Democrats will pursue if they retake the House in next month’s election. Lowering health care costs, rebuilding infrastructure, and running the House chamber with more transparency and openness are near the top of the Democratic agenda, Pelosi said during a talk Tuesday at Harvard’s Institute of Politics. Democrats would also prioritize giving legal status to young immigrants, known informally as Dreamers, and strengthening background checks on gun purchases, she said. Democrats need to gain 23 seats to take control of the House from Republicans, something surveys suggest is within reach. “If the election were today, we would win the majority,” Pelosi said. The California Democrat said she couldn’t predict whether the election would be a “wave” or “tsunami” for her party, but said she expected it to triumph, putting her in line to regain the speaker’s gavel. “I’ve never seen anything like the mobilization that is out there, the grass roots,” she said. One item not on Pelosi’s top 10 list: impeaching President Donald Trump. “I think impeachment, to use that word, is very divisive,” she said. Instead, she said House committees…

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Commentary: Dems’ Beautiful Blue Wave More Like Stagnant Algae-Filled Millpond

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by Jeffrey A. Rendall   It’s always curious when political pundits and media figures use terms like “waves” to describe forthcoming or just concluded elections results. According to the dictionary, a “wave” (used as a noun) is, “a long body of water curling into an arched form and breaking on the shore, or, a gesture or signal made by moving one’s hand to and fro.” As we move ever closer to election day 2018 it’s become clear American voters already dismissed the possibility of the first type of  Democrat “wave” to leave room for a “gesture” or “signal” to the minority party (we’ll leave it to your imagination as to which “gesture” is most appropriate). If anything, the ocean-type “wave” the pundits love droning on about is now headed back out to sea, never to reach the sandy shores of Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. By all appearances the same phenomenon that produced the election surprise of the millennium (to some folks at least) in 2016 is sweeping over the entire country again this year. Once confident Democrats are now pulling back their grandiose predictions that Republicans will be brutally kicked out of the Speaker’s and Majority Leader’s offices in…

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Why More Americans Are Moving to Smaller Cities

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by Dora Mekouar   More Americans are moving to smaller cities in search of a better quality of life. They’re leaving places like Los Angeles, Chicago and New York for mid-sized cities such as Phoenix and Las Vegas, according to an analysis of data from the U.S. Census Bureau. A huge draw for these second-tier cities is that the cost of housing consumes a much smaller chunk of people’s salaries. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, more than half of the people who move do so for housing-related reasons. They’re looking for a new or better home, cheaper housing, or to buy a home rather than rent. It costs about $4,100 a month to rent a place in Manhattan. That’s almost two-thirds of New York City’s median household income of $83,500. Buying a home is even more out of reach. The average cost of a home in the area is $1.1 million. More than half a million people left the New York boroughs of Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens over a five-year period between 2012 and 2017. In Los Angeles, the metropolitan county with the largest outbound net domestic migration, rent costs about $2,100 a month — about 38…

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Nashville Fraternal Order of Police: Proposed Amendment One Not Constitutional

Chris Butler

NASHVILLE, Tennessee — Members of the Nashville Fraternal Order of the Police said Tuesday they have serious constitutional concerns about the proposed Amendment One. If voters approve it next month then city officials would create a community oversight board over the police. Former FOP President Robert Weaver spoke for the organization at a press conference at the Nashville Metro Courthouse late Tuesday. “There are several aspects of this legislation that are constitutionally questionable. There are issues we have (with this proposed amendment) that don’t address due process,” Weaver said. “It appears this board is not set up for fact finding and truth finding. It appears this board is set up for some means of retaliation and retribution for a problem that doesn’t seem to exist.” Weaver said this plan, if enacted, will waste $10 million taxpayer dollars. He called the proposed board “redundant” because there are other means for redress against the police already available in Nashville. “You already have the ability to file a complaint with an officer’s supervisor. You have the ability to file with the district attorney’s office, the US attorney’s office, or the TBI and the FBI. There is even recourse through civil courts if you…

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