Day: January 9, 2019

Beth Harwell Hands the Gavel to New Speaker of the Tennessee House Glen Casada As 28 New State Representatives Are Sworn In

Laura Baigert

NASHVILLE, Tennessee – In the first phase of new leadership in the State of Tennessee, 28 new Representatives were sworn in to the 111th Tennessee General Assembly and the speaker’s gavel was handed from the first female Speaker, Beth Harwell, to Glen Casada. Tennessee’s leadership transition will be complete when Governor-elect Bill Lee is inaugurated on January 19. In front of a capacity crowd on the floor and in the galleries consisting largely of their families, the duly elected state representatives made their oath of office. The next order of business was to elect a new Speaker of the House, which started with a motion by House Majority Leader William Lamberth (R-Cottontown) nominating Republican Speaker-elect Glen Casada (R-Franklin). Karen Camper (D-Memphis) was the Democrat nominee for Speaker. A roll-call vote resulted in 75 votes for Casada to Camper’s 22 with one “present not voting” and one representative absent. In his acceptance speech which he began near tears, Casada recognized former House Speakers Bill Jenkins, Kent Williams and Jimmy Naifeh. Casada also expressed his appreciation for his immediate predecessor, Beth Harwell, calling her “a woman of character” and a “true class act,” which was punctuated by a standing ovation. With Harwell…

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Carol Swain Commentary: Race-Baiting Democrats Losing Respect

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by Carol M. Swain   Two senior Democratic Party leaders have separately offered advice that Democratic activists would do well to heed. Outgoing California Gov. Jerry Brown and defeated Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) have warned of impending dangers to a political party that seems a bit too cocky and way too secular. Democrats have become the party that pits racial and ethnic groups against each other in the name of equality, and openly disdains Bible-believing Christians. Brown and McCaskill recognize the dangers of pursuing ideological agendas that ignore the issues and concerns of mainstream Americans. Brown, whose state in 2018 had no Republicans elected statewide, recently affirmed his belief in the necessity of a strong two-party system. Democrats need Republicans to keep them honest and on their toes. In a recent NPR interview, Brown postulated that “the weakness of the Republican Party has let the Democratic Party … get further out [on the left] than … the majority of people want.” Wow! This coming from “Governor Moonbeam.” McCaskill’s 2018 defeat was partially linked to her decision to vote against the confirmation of Justice Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court. She has blamed pro-choice progressives for their refusal to give their…

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Trump Asks Dems ‘How Much More American Blood’ They’re Willing to Shed in Oval Office Address

Anthony Gockowski

In a highly anticipated prime-time event, President Donald Trump delivered his first Oval Office address Tuesday night to discuss the continued battle over funding for his border wall. “This is just common sense. The border wall would very quickly pay for itself. The cost of illegal drugs exceeds $500 billion a year vastly more than the $5.7 billion we have requested from Congress. The wall will also be paid for indirectly by the great new trade deal we have made with Mexico,” Trump said. He also pointed out that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has “repeatedly supported a physical barrier in the past along with many other Democrats.” “How much more American blood must we shed before Congress does its job? To those who refuse to compromise in the name of border security I would ask: imagine if it was your child, your husband, or your wife whose life was so cruelly shattered and totally broken. To every member of Congress: pass a bill that ends this crisis,” Trump said. Schumer and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA-12) responded to Trump in their own address Tuesday night. “I appreciate the opportunity to speak directly to the American people…

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OFF THE RECORD: Is Bill Lee Closing in on an Education Commissioner?

Zachery Schmidt

Rumors out of the Bill Lee Transition Office are circulating that his list of possible Education Commissioners is being narrowed as they are apparently wrapping up interviews this week. In the next week the Lee team plans to wrap up their selection of Commissioners. Some of the names that continue to be mentioned as potential contenders for Education Commissioner include: – Former House Speaker Beth Harwell – Athens City Schools Superintendent Melanie Miller – Maryville City Schools Director Mike Winstead – Interim Ed. Commissioner Lyle Ailshie – Former Achievement School District Supt. Malika Anderson – Former Asst. Ed. Commissioner Kathleen Airhart – Louisiana Commissioner of Education John White – Professional Educators of Tennessee Exec. Dir. JC Bowman – Former State Rep. Eddie Smith (Knoxville) Former Tennessee Education Commissioner Kevin Huffman, who actively promoted Common Core, oversaw and essentially created Tennessee’s testing nightmares, and who admittedly voted for Barack Obama before being tabbed by Governor Haslam for the top Education job in Tennessee, is reportedly NOT on the short list. However, the large number of Bill Lee insiders who previously worked for Huffman’s ex-wife Michelle Rhee at StudentsFirst, may be a red flag that anything is possible.        …

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Tennessee Star Report EXCLUSIVE: Congressman Mark Green Discusses the National and Humanitarian Crisis at the Border

Julie Carr
Steve Gill, Mark Green

On Tuesday’s Tennessee Star Report with Steve Gill and Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 am to 8:00 am – Gill and Leahy talked to recently elected Congressman from Tennessee, Mark Green about his recent rise to fame of Congress’s Freshman class, the transition, and how he’s leading the way in declining a paycheck while the government is in a shutdown. During the course of the interview, Green gave his thoughts and opinions about the border wall’s national security and humanitarian crisis and his strategy to create a cultural change within the House. Gill: Congressman Mark Green has kicked things off with a flurry of activity.  He’s on what, CBS, Fox News every time you turn on the TV he’s making headlines and leading the way. He was one of the first, if not the first to say I’m not going to take my paycheck while the government is shutdown. So he’s the pro bono Congressman from Tennessee at this point. I’ve worked free for clients a lot of times.  I didn’t intend to, they just didn’t pay.  But in this case, Mark Green has continued to show up for…

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Trump Team Holds China’s Feet to the Fire on Trade Negotiations

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Donald Trump, Xi Jinping

by Jason Hopkins   As the Trump administration continues trade negotiations with China, the U.S. delegation is taking additional steps to make sure the Communist country follows through on its pledges. U.S. and Chinese officials met Monday in the Commerce Ministry in Beijing to begin their two-day trade negotiations. The meeting marks the first face-to-face talks between the two governments since Chinese President Xi Jinping and President Donald Trump agreed to a tariff truce when they met during G-20 summit. During that G-20 meeting — which took place in the early days of December in Buenos Aires — Xi agreed to a number of concessions in exchange for Trump agreeing to postpone a round of tariffs on Chinese goods. Among many things, the Communist leader pledged to buy more U.S. agricultural and industrial products, allow increased access to Chinese markets, and abide by more cybersecurity and property theft rules. In return, Trump promised to wait 90 days before hiking tariffs to 25 percent on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports — the three-month timeline is indented to give both breathing room to cement a detailed agreement. However, China has a history of not keeping its word. The Communist country has,…

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Parents File Suit Against School District That Wants to Allow Teachers to Carry Guns

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by Neetu Chandak   Parents and a grandparent filed a lawsuit against a Pennsylvania school district on Thursday over a policy allowing teachers to carry guns in school. Tamaqua Area School District in Tamaqua, Pennsylvania, approved the policy in September 2018, according The Associated Press reported Friday. The policy allows teachers, staff and administration to carry district-issued guns after going through the appropriate training. The lawsuit claims approving the policy “endangered their community” and broke state law. “It’s uncharted territory, but there is no law that says we can’t have legally trained armed staff,” school board member Nicholas Boyle said, WHYY reported. State law allows campuses to have trained school resource officers or school police, The AP reported. Executive director for gun control group CeaseFirePA, Shira Goodman, said she found the district’s interpretation of the law questionable, WHYY reported. “I would say it’s not at all clear that they can be doing this,” Goodman said, according to WHYY. Boyle said that the initiative would make the rural school district less vulnerable against an attacker, according to WHYY. “The rationale for the policy is to prevent the apocalypse,” Boyle said, The AP reported. “When we have a shooter in the building,…

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Commentary: Now That School Security is a Multi-Billion Dollar Industry, is There a Better Way to Protect Children?

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by Kerry McDonald   U.S. taxpayers spend nearly $700 billion each year on K-12 public schooling and that eye-popping sum shows no sign of slowing. In fact, as more non-academic programs get adopted in schools across the country, the price-tag for mass schooling continues to swell even as achievement lags. One ballooning school expenditure is the vast amount of money allocated to school safety. U.S. schools now spend an estimated $2.7 billion on security features, from automatically locking doors, to video surveillance and facial recognition software. That amount doesn’t include the additional billions of dollars spent on armed guards at schools. Federal spending on school security is also rising, with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security recently awarding a $2.3 million grant to train high school students how to act like first responders in the event of a mass casualty, like a school shooting. These enhanced security and training mechanisms may seem justified, particularly in the wake of deadly mass school shootings like the massacre in Parkland, Florida that left 17 people dead. But school shootings are exceedingly rare. As Harvard University instructor, David Ropeik, writes in the Washington Post: “The chance of a child being shot and killed in…

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Chicago Police Chief Making Officers Read Nearly 500-Page Report on Florida’s Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting

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By Neetu Chandak   A Chicago suburb police chief is making his officers read the nearly 500-page Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting report to prevent the same mistakes made in Florida. The Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission released the initial report, which made recommendations like arming teachers and investing more into mental health programs, on Jan. 2. Missteps included officers not confronting suspected shooter Nikolas Cruz immediately, the school lacking a clear lockdown plan and inefficient communication systems. “This report on the shooting in Parkland is a game-changer for law enforcement,” Riverside Police Chief Tom Weitzel said, WBBM Newsradio reported Monday. https://t.co/zRlnekaDMe — Riverside Police (@PDRiverside) January 7, 2019 Weitzel added that while there were officers who were heroic, there were also “large failures.” He felt the report addressed the mistakes, according to WBBM. “We must learn from our mistakes and others mistakes,” Weitzel said to The Daily Caller News Foundation over email. “It’s the only way we can improve our response and tactics.” The Parkland shooting left 17 people dead on Feb. 14, 2018. Officers have a month to read the report and will be followed up with a discussion, the Chicago Tribune reported. Weitzel will have…

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Judge Says Christian Baker Jack Phillips’ Lawsuit Against Civil Rights Officials Can Proceed

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by Kevin Daley   A federal judge in Denver rejected Colorado’s bid to dismiss a lawsuit alleging that state civil rights officials are waging a campaign of harassment against Jack Phillips, the Christian baker at issue in the landmark Masterpiece Cakeshop case. Three weeks after Phillips prevailed at the Supreme Court, a state anti-discrimination panel issued a new probable cause finding against him, arising from his refusal to create a gender transition cake for a would-be patron called Autumn Scardina. In turn, Phillips’ attorneys charged the panel with acting in bad faith, and asked a federal court to stop the new prosecution. “Colorado is acting in bad faith and with bias toward Jack,” said Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) attorney Jim Campbell, who represents Phillips. “We look forward to moving forward with this lawsuit to ensure that Jack isn’t forced to create custom cakes that express messages in conflict with his faith.” The state asked U.S. District Judge Wiley Daniel to dismiss the lawsuit on three grounds: First, the state argued that the case should be dismissed because of legal rules that forbid federal courts from intervening in ongoing state court proceedings. Second, Colorado said that the 11th Amendment — which…

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EPA Climate Model Shows ‘Green New Deal’ Would Avert a ‘Barely Detectable’ Amount of Global Warming

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by Michael Bastasch   Democrats are increasingly lining up behind New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s call for a “Green New Deal,” but few, if any, have talked about its actual impact on global warming. Even if all the Green New Deal’s goals were achieved, it would have a negligible, and likely immeasurable, impact on projected global warming, according to climate model simulation provided by a libertarian think tank. “I seriously think the effect would — at best — be barely detectable in the climate record,” Patrick Michaels, a climatologist with the Cato Institute, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. Cato developed its own “Carbon Tax Temperature-Savings Calculator” to estimate the amount of warming that might be averted through reducing greenhouse gas emissions, like carbon dioxide. The carbon calculator is based on the so-called “MAGICC” climate model simulator, developed by the National Center for Atmospheric Research with funding from the Environmental Protection Agency. So, how much warming would a “Green New Deal” avert by the end of the century? Slightly under 0.14 degrees Celsius, according to Cato’s temperature calculator. “The year-to-year variation is very close to the total amount of warming that would be ‘saved’ by 2100, according to EPA’s own…

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McNally Re-elected Tennessee Lt. Governor and Speaker of the State Senate

Jason M. Reynolds

State Sen. Randy McNally (R-TN-05) was re-elected to a second term as Speaker of the Senate, and thus Lieutenant Governor, Tuesday. State senators met at noon Tuesday, the first organizational day of the 111th General Assembly to elect their speaker, according to a press release from McNally’s office. By state statute, the Speaker of the Senate holds the title of Lieutenant Governor. McNally has served in the positions since January 2017. Mark Norris, a federal judge in Memphis, swore in McNally as speaker and the members who were elected, WBIR reported. Norris was formerly the Senate Majority Leader until the U.S. Senate voted 51-44 in October to appoint him as a judge. Gov.-elect Bill Lee tweeted, “Congratulations to @ltgovmcnally and @GlenCasada.  I am honored to have the opportunity to work with both of you this session, and I look forward to what we can accomplish together to make this state an even better place for all Tennesseans.” Congratulations to @ltgovmcnally and @GlenCasada. I am honored to have the opportunity to work with both of you this session, and I look forward to what we can accomplish together to make this state an even better place for all Tennesseans. — Bill…

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Wisconsin Governor Issues Executive Order on ‘Gender Identity or Expression’ on First Day in Office

Anthony Gockowski

In one of his first acts in office, Gov. Tony Evers (D-WI) signed an executive order seeking to prohibit discrimination on the basis of “gender identity or expression” in state agencies. Executive Order #1 states that it “is the expressed policy of my administration that the executive branch should prevent discrimination and harassment against any class of citizens because of age, race, religion, color, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression,” and so forth. The order is not yet available online, likely because Evers was just sworn in Monday, but he posted a picture of it to his Facebook page. “In addition to the excitement of taking the oath of office today, I had the opportunity to sign my first two executive orders as governor. These orders prevent discrimination in state agencies and recognize the importance of state employees,” Ever said in a Facebook post. “Each person deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. This fosters sound government, society, and business, and it’s just the right thing to do.” According to The Capital Times, the order states that any recipients of government contracts or grants can only hire on the basis of merit, and requires the Equal Employment…

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SCOTUS Will Hear North Carolina Partisan Gerrymandering Case

A.P. Dillon

The U.S. Supreme Court announced last week that in March it will hear partisan gerrymandering cases involving North Carolina and Maryland. These partisan gerrymandering cases are the first of their kind to be heard since Justice Brett Kavanaugh replaced Justice Anthony Kennedy on the court. The decision to hear these cases will likely have ramifications for a suit filed last November by Common Cause and the North Carolina Democratic Party. The case, Common Cause v. Lewis, alleges partisan gerrymandering in district maps drawn by the Republican majority-held legislature.  The case was recently denied a delay and remanded back to North Carolina Superior Court by Federal District Judge Louise Flanagan. Filed in Wake County court, the complaint demands the maps be redrawn for use in 2020 and alleges that the districts violate the state’s constitution in three areas: The Equal Protection Clause, the Free Elections Clause, and the Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Assembly clauses. The suit also alleges that the current districts are “intentionally burdening the protected speech and/or expressive conduct of Plaintiffs and other Democratic voters, including members of Common Cause and the NCDP, based on their identity, their viewpoints, and the content of their speech.” “Because lawmakers…

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As US Economy Swells, Ohio Gets Left Behind

Andrew Shirley

2018 was one of the best economic years for America in decades. The coup de grâce came in December with a jobs report that shattered the most generous expectations by more than double. 312,000 new jobs were added to the US economy. While unemployment rose slightly, this was primarily due to more people getting back into the job market after giving up hope of finding work. In total, more than 2.6 million jobs were added in 2018; the fastest job growth in decades. So how did Ohio fare? Not great. Ohio undoubtedly had some noteworthy achievements. 2018 was Ohio’s ninth consecutive year of record-breaking new business filings with 125,000 new businesses created. In July, Ohio’s jobs growth pace actually exceeded the national pace. Overall, Ohio added jobs and employment grew. Sadly, in some of the most key indicators, Ohio continued to lag behind the nation. In November, while the national unemployment rate rested at 3.7% (its lowest rate in 2018), Ohio’s unemployment rate was 4.6%. Ohio’s best month for unemployment (4.3%) didn’t even beat the nation’s worst month (4.1%). From January to November of 2018, Ohio’s total number of unemployed went from 271,269 to 263,197, a net employment of only 8,072 jobs. While some…

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Tim Walz Confronted by Pipeline Protesters at Capitol Hours After Inauguration

Anthony Gockowski

Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) faced his first test Monday just hours after being sworn in when protesters opposed to the Enbridge Line 3 Pipeline project disrupted his reception at the State Capitol. This isn’t the first time anti-pipeline activists have caused a public disruption. In November, they shut down a performance in Minneapolis after the Public Utilities Commission voted unanimously in favor of approving the project to replace Line 3. Activists say that replacing the aging pipeline, which crosses through northern Minnesota, could present the risk of an oil spill in the Mississippi River, and will contribute to climate change by adding high rates of carbon to the atmosphere. Now former Gov. Mark Dayton (D-M) made a last minute appeal of the project in December through his Department of Commerce, which said that Enbridge “failed to provide a future demand forecast for its product.” On Monday, activists with Stop Line 3 and Cooperation Northfield disrupted Walz while he delivered a speech to a crowd gathered at the State Capitol after his inauguration. The protesters began by draping banners from the Capitol rotunda containing riffs on his campaign slogan of “One Minnesota.” “Hey, Tim. We only have one Minnesota. Stop Line…

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Rep. Green, Sen. Blackburn Back Trump’s Call for Border Security From Primetime Oval Office Address

Jason M. Reynolds

Two of Tennessee’s newest members of Congress, U.S. Rep. Dr. Mark Green (R-TN-07) and U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), backed President Donald Trump’s statements on border security in Tuesday night’s primetime address from the Oval Office. Green is a former special operations flight surgeon and veteran who did tours in both the Iraq and Afghanistan. The freshman congressman appeared on “Fox News Sunday” this past weekend and said he would support Trump on improving border security. Green said in a statement Tuesday: Tonight, a lot of Americans learned, perhaps for the first time, there is really an urgent crisis and it involves our southern border. The crisis is causing human suffering and death, and it is heartbreaking. One of the more another alarming stats shared – 90% of the heroin in our country comes across our southern border. Heroin, in turn, kills 300 Americans each week. As a veteran of the War on Terror, I know that if we were losing 300 Americans a week in the field of battle, Americans and our leaders in DC would be strategizing how to win the war and limit casualties. In this case, the strategy is simple – we secure our border, and…

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