Month: January 2019

Vanderbilt to Host Never-Trumper, Former Senator Jeff Flake, in Liberal Love Fest Lecture Series Thursday

Jason M. Reynolds

Never-Trumper and now former U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) is bringing his show Thursday to liberal Vanderbilt University to preach his agenda to a friendly audience at the Chancellor’s Lecture Series. Tennessee Star Political Editor Steve Gill said, “It certainly hasn’t taken former Senator Flake long to move from criticizing Republicans on the taxpayer’s dime to doing the same thing for even larger payoffs from the #fakenews media and liberal academic institutions. Their favorite Republicans are the ones who attack Republicans, and Flake is only too happy to fill that role. Do they pay him with 30 pieces of silver for each appearance? Based on the overwhelmingly leftwing list of previous speakers at the Vanderbilt Chancellor’s Lectures, Flake is a perfect fit.” Vanderbilt is touting Flake’s anti-Trump record to promote the event, which starts at 6:30 p.m. in Langford Auditorium. The university’s press release says, “Fresh from a term that included several highly publicized ideological clashes with the president, former Sen. Jeff Flake will visit Vanderbilt University to explain his hopes for American politics going forward.” Flake is being joined by Zoe Chace, producer of “This American Life,” whom the university says produced a show highlighting his work before he…

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All-Star Christian Music Lineup to Lead Worship Service for Bill Lee’s Gubernatorial Inauguration Saturday

Jason M. Reynolds

Bill Lee’s gubernatorial inauguration Saturday will include some leading Contemporary Christian musicians, including his old friend Michael W. Smith. The 2019 Inaugural Worship Service will feature Michael W. Smith, CeCe Winans, Steven Curtis Chapman, Nicole C. Mullen, Matthew West and others, the governor-elect’s team said on his transition website. The service will be held at Ryman Auditorium Saturday at 8:30 a.m. CST. Tickets for the worship service are required and free to the public here based on seating availability. Attendees are encouraged to arrive early and be seated for the start of the worship service. Smith, who has won more than 45 Dove awards and three Grammy awards, said in a statement, “Bill and I have been friends for decades. His dedication to his Creator, his family, our community and now our state is unmatched. Starting the day of his inauguration in prayer and worship is a sincere and honest reflection of the type people Bill and Maria are. They will be outstanding servant-leaders for the great State of Tennessee.” Following the worship service, Lee will take the oath of office to become the 50th Tennessee governor at a ceremony convening on Legislative Plaza at 11 a.m. CST. The oath will…

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Don Barnett Commentary: Things That Are Taken Down After Dark

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by Don Barnett   There is little argument that the Memphis City Council pulled a fast one in its decision to circumvent state law by selling two of its city parks to a nonprofit, which then immediately removed statues of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, President Jefferson Davis and the uncontroversial Capt. J. Harvey Mathes on December 20, 2017. The removal had been a point of contention for years and much of the political class applauded the novel approach to the problem. It is worth remembering, however, that removal booster Memphis Rep. Steve Cohen voted against the removal of the Forrest statue in 1984 when he was on the Memphis city council. Direct descendants of Nathan Bedford Forrest filed a lawsuit on Dec 17, 2018 against the city of Memphis over the removal of the statue from the gravesite of the Confederate general, his wife and, likely, others who were interred on the grounds earlier. It may be the first time that living descendants of a national historical figure have filed such a suit to protect their ancestor’s grave site. The chances of open discussion of the matter are looking pretty dim based on media handling of the issue so…

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Tennessee Democratic Caucus Staff Member Reportedly Stole More Money Than Originally Thought

Chris Butler

A staffer tasked with handling financial payments for the Tennessee House Democratic Caucus reportedly stole more money than originally believed — $12,000 instead of $3,000. This, according to the Memphis-based WMC Action News 5. As The Tennessee Star reported last month, the man accused of the theft, Derrick Tibbs, worked for State Rep. Karen Camper, D-Memphis. At the time, officials alleged Tibbs had stolen at least $3,000, according to The Star. But a CPA firm did an audit and discovered Tibbs took more than $12,000 by writing checks to himself, WMC Action News 5 reported. The station reported Camper met with members of the House Democratic Caucus in Nashville to discuss the situation. “I did probably put too much trust in him than I should have. I’ll take the hit on that,” the station quoted Camper as saying. “I was deeply hurt and saddened because he worked for me.” WMC went on to say Tibbs took the money from a fundraising account throughout a three-year time span. As The Star reported, Tibbs resigned and offered to make restitution after Nashville TV station WSMV reported his alleged activities writing checks to himself. The checks reportedly need two signatures — one from a lawmaker, the…

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Letter to the Editor: PETA VP of Cruelty Investigations Responds to Cornerstone Baptist Church

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Dear Tennessee Star, Re: Chris Butler’s January 14 article Dear Editor: The “contest” mentioned in Chris Butler’s January 14 article is run by a front group for Outback Steakhouse, KFC, Philip Morris, and other enterprises that subject billions of animals to miserable lives and violent, painful deaths every year. This group fears PETA’s impact in educating people about the meat industry’s cruelty and changing consumers’ buying habits, so its self-professed strategy is to “shoot the messenger.” PETA’s campaigns get people thinking and talking about the fact that the choices we make – like what we eat or how we entertain ourselves – are matters of life and death to animals. Our work has helped people realize that using animals for “entertainment” and forcing them to perform are cruel. Hollywild Animal Park – the roadside zoo that supplied exotic animals to Cornerstone Church – has a notorious history of USDA citations, including for failure to provide animals with veterinary care, minimum space, and proper food and water; having filthy and foul-smelling enclosures; and many other issues. In 2015, Hollywild was fined nearly $19,000 for violations and more than two dozen animals were killed in a fire at the decrepit facility. PETA…

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Detroit Auto Show, and Industry, Prepare for Transition

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The auto industry gathered in Detroit on Sunday, on the eve of the last winter edition of North America’s premiere auto show, as carmakers grapple with a contracting market and uncertainty in the year ahead. Concerns over the health of the global economy and a US-China trade war loomed over the North American International Auto Show, as it prepared to open Monday with the first five days dedicated to the media and industry insiders. The show opens to the general public on January 19. While a number of major announcements were expected – including an anticipated strategic alliance between Ford and Volkswagen – there will be fewer automakers and new car unveilings, making it more subdued. “This is a transition year for the Detroit show,” said analyst Michelle Krebs of Autotrader. “It’s kind of emblematic of where the industry is. We’re in a transition in the industry.” After a 10-year boom, analysts expect North American auto sales to contract in 2019, as consumers face pressures and carmakers grapple with multiple uncertainties. Rising interest rates and car prices have squeezed car buyers, and fewer of them are able to afford increasingly pricey, technology-heavy cars. Kelley Blue Book predicted the average new-car…

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Commentary: At a Cost of $25 Billion Once Versus $165 Billion Annually, Trump’s ‘Wall’ Math Holds Up

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by Spencer P. Morrison   Scott Adams, the creator of the popular cartoon “Dilbert,” transformed himself into a persona non grata in 2016 by exposing how Donald Trump manipulated the media by using sophisticated persuasion techniques. History proved Adams was correct and Trump won the election. As it turns out, Trump was not the bumbling blowhard of CNN’s fever dreams. He was a marketing mastermind whose words went far beyond “resonating” with ordinary Americans—they stuck. Epithets like crooked, lyin’, and low-energy were not just insults, they were silver bullets spoken by a silver tongue. Hillary, Ted, and Jeb didn’t know what hit ’em. Two years on and Trump’s word-wizardry is as potent as ever – Pocahontas‘s racial fraud is now common knowledge, and Trump’s little rocket man jab arguably set the stage for North Korea’s denuclearization summit. At this point, Trump’s language is indistinguishable from political magic. For example, Trump’s push for “the wall” has turned ardent socialists into laissez-faire economists on the issue of illegal immigration – who cares if migration hurts America’s most vulnerable? We need aliens to grow the economy! This flip-flop has made it clear to ordinary Americans: the Democratic Party cares more about illegal aliens than it does the common citizen. Another Brick in the Wall The Democratic Party shut down the government to…

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American Farmers Support Trump Despite Tariffs

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by Tim Pearce   American farmers are sticking behind President Donald Trump despite a trade agenda that makes selling produce to foreign countries more difficult and less profitable, Bloomberg reported. The United States’s ongoing trade war with China is a primary concern for U.S. farmers that sell crops, especially soybeans, overseas. While Trump’s view on and use of tariffs are not popular in the agriculture community, many of his other policies are. “We send [China] a lot of soybeans,” Aron Carlson, who farms corn and soy in Indiana, told Bloomberg. “They’re basically buying every other bushel in the world and we’re the last invited to the table, and I don’t like to be last. I want to be front and center, as far as that stuff goes.” “I hope he can get the whole trade thing with China figured out. I think we need to quit picking some fights,” Carlson said. Carlson voted for Trump and is still backing the president, though his support is “softening.” In the ongoing fight over the partial government shutdown and funding for a border wall with Mexico, Carlson agrees with Trump that there are “serious problems going on with that border.” Also, farmers are willing to take short-term financial hits…

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President Trump’s 2019 Shutdown Minimizes the Impact on Citizens, Where President Obama’s Maximized the Impact in 2013

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by Molly Prince   Services typically suspended during government shutdowns have continued to operate under the Trump administration, with insiders pointing to acting Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought (pictured above) as the reason why. Agencies impacted by government shutdowns are forced to severely cut back on operations, suspend services and often send workers home without pay. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has been using creative solutions to blunt the burden, according to a senior administration official and several prominent Republicans. Vought joined the OMB in early 2018 and assumed the role of acting director Jan. 3 after Director Mick Mulvaney became President Donald Trump’s acting chief of staff. “My marching orders from Russ is to make this shutdown as painless as possible,” a senior administration official, who asked to speak on background so they could speak frankly, told The Daily Caller News Foundation. The response by the Trump administration has differed greatly from that of the previous administration during the 2013 shutdown. “What the marching orders in the last administration were was to weaponize the shutdown, to make it as painful as possible,” the official continued. “They did things as a policy matter, to not keep programs running,…

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Supreme Court Turns Down Challenge To Matthew Whitaker’s Appointment As Acting AG

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by Kevin Daley   The Supreme Court rejected an unusual challenge to Matthew Whitaker’s appointment as acting Attorney General on Monday. The challenge arose in the context of a Second Amendment case from Nevada, where an independent political activist named Barry Michaels challenged a provision of the Federal Gun Control Act which prohibits convicted felons from possessing firearms. Michaels’ convictions were for non-violent crimes and he has lived in accordance with the law for 20 years. Whitaker became the named defendant in Michaels’ case when he was appointed acting AG. Shortly thereafter, Michaels and his attorneys filed a motion at the Supreme Court challenging Whitaker’s appointment. The motion argued that a federal law called the Attorney General Succession Act controls the accession of leadership at the Department of Justice. That law provides that the Deputy Attorney General should become the acting AG when a vacancy in that office arises. As such, Michaels said Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is the rightful acting AG, not Whitaker. Michaels also raised a constitutional issue, arguing that the appointments clause requires Senate confirmation for all principal officers of the government, even those serving in an acting capacity. Whitaker was chief of staff to former Attorney General Jeff Sessions…

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Youngest Black Legislator In America Won on a Platform of ‘God, Guns, and Babies’

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by Evie Fordham   The West Virginia House of Delegates convened Wednesday with a record-setter in its midst – freshman Del. Caleb L. Hanna, who became the nation’s youngest black legislator following his election at age 19 in November 2018. “I always knew that I was not satisfied with the leadership I was getting within my own house district,” Hanna told The Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview. “I told myself if I ever had my opportunity to take that, I would give it my shot.” At first, his small Republican campaign was designed to push Democratic incumbent Dana Lynch to be “more proactive in the legislature,” Hanna told TheDCNF. But things shifted when Hanna realized he could win the Republican primary — even if he was running his campaign from his dorm room at West Virginia State University, where he studies economics. Leading up to the general election, Hanna faced doubts about his age and experience, a shoestring budget and one instance of racist flyers he reported to law enforcement. But Hanna defeated Lynch by roughly 25 points in West Virginia’s House of Delegates District 44 in November, with results reported as 60.3 to 35.7, according to Ballotpedia. Making It…

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Mike Huckabee Calls For Prosecution Of Politically Biased FBI Agents

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by Nick Givas   Former Republican Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee called for the prosecution of politically biased FBI agents, on “Fox & Friends” Monday, and said the agency needs to clean house. “I think, you know, at some point, somebody’s got to take a good Dyson vacuum cleaner to go over to the FBI and just clean out the leadership. Because there’s something wrong at the top,” Huckabee said. “There needs to be, then, accountability for those who are being cleaned out and there’s still some there that shouldn’t be. The rank and file deserve better leadership than this,” he continued, adding: They’re good people in the FBI. They’re good, hard-working people of integrity that are disgusted with what’s happened to their agency that they committed themselves to. And they deserve better leadership. And I’m really hoping that there will be people truly held accountable. Not just fired, but I’m talking about truly held accountable. And some need to be prosecuted for using their positions as a political weapon. https://youtu.be/lCMQwFASrVs?t=1420   Huckabee had been discussing stories from The New York Times and The Washington Post about the FBI’s inquiry into President Donald Trump’s supposed connection with Russia and said the agency’s actions should scare the public. “What…

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Volkswagen to Funnel $800 Million into Chattanooga Plant to Build Electric Vehicles as President Trump Pressures German Companies to Invest in America

Jason M. Reynolds

Volkswagen will spend $800 million to expand its Chattanooga factory to become the German company’s North American hub for manufacturing electric vehicles, and the Scenic City may want to thank President Donald Trump. VW CEO Dr. Herbert Diess made the announcement at a presentation at the Detroit Auto Show Monday, TechCrunch said. The expansion is expected to create 1,000 jobs at the Chattanooga plant. The German company is moving away from diesel following the 2015 emissions cheating scandal. VW Group plans to spend nearly $50 billion in the next five years toward the development and production of electric vehicles and digital services, TechCrunch said. VW’s news means another feather in Tennessee’s cap for a growing automotive industry. In response to VW’s announcement, U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) said in a statement, “This follows General Motors’ announcement yesterday that it will produce its new Cadillac XT6 crossover in Spring Hill. The Middle Tennessee location is the product of an over $2 billion investment since 2010. It is the largest GM facility in North America at 7.1 million square feet and has brought 3,400 jobs to the area. “Volkswagen and General Motors’ decisions are further proof that Tennessee workers and our business friendly climate…

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Steve Gill Commentary: The Christian Vote, Particularly the Catholic Votes, Are Critical to Trump’s Re-Election in 2020

Steve Gill

Three states in the midwest that Hillary Clinton was counting on to carry her to victory in 2016 narrowly ended up in the Donald Trump column — Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. If those three states had been won by Clinton, their 46 Electoral votes would have given her the presidency with slightly more than the necessary 270 needed to win. The total vote margin for Donald Trump in all three of those states was only 107,000! He carried Michigan by 11,837. Wisconsin by 27,257. Pennsylvania by 68,236. The big question as 2020 looms is whether he can retain or expand those margins regardless of whom the Democrats pick as their standard-bearer. Democrats won Senate races in all three states in 2018 and knocked off Republican Governor Scott Walker in Wisconsin as well, giving them hope that they can swing them back to blue in 2020. Christian voters were a key component in Trump’s victory in those and other battleground states, like Ohio, Florida and Iowa. George Barna detailed the impact of the Christian vote in 2016 in his book The Day Christians Changed America.  Groups like Lift the Vote, a non-profit focused on energizing and mobilizing Evangelical voters in key…

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Tennessee Amusement Tax May Get Dragged Through Courts if Legislators Do Nothing

Chris Butler

This year, Tennessee legislators may or may not do away with what is known as an amusement tax on small gyms and health clubs throughout the state. If, for whatever reason, Tennessee General Assembly members choose not to kill the tax then small gym and small health club owners may fight the matter out in court. This, according to Jeff Rose, who manages the Orangetheory Fitness in Lakeland. On the state end, a long and protracted legal battle will cost taxpayer money. As The Tennessee Star reported, large gym owners throughout the state don’t have to pay this tax. Small business owners do, and they must pass the higher costs of doing business down to their customers. The tax amounts to about 10 percent. State legislators plan to review the law this year. “Eliminating the tax will ensure the state does not face almost certain costs of litigation because if it doesn’t pass this session then our only last recourse, if we still want to pursue it, is through the courts,” Rose told The Star. Rose said he could not describe how much money his customers lose every year because of the tax because that’s “proprietary information.” But he did…

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Most, But Not All Tennessee Republican D.C. Representatives Are Die Hard About the Border Wall

Chris Butler

Republicans Chuck Fleischmann, Scott DesJarlais, and Marsha Blackburn have all reportedly come out swinging in support of President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall. U.S. Republican Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, however, seems to have taken a more passive approach. Alexander’s junior colleague, U.S. Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn reportedly told The Cleveland Banner this week that, despite the shutdown, a large portion of the federal government, about 75 percent, still functions. Blackburn, according to The Banner, blamed the shutdown on Democrats, who refuse to negotiate. “It is sad they are putting partisan politics ahead of the American people,” the paper quoted Blackburn as saying. “It is unconscionable they would refuse to secure the border and protect our nation. Drugs, human sex and labor traffickers and gang members cross into this country — illegally every day. It is imperative that we secure the border and end illegal entry.” The United States, Blackburn went on to tell the paper, spends billions of dollars each year in foreign aid, money she said this country could use to secure the border — for one-tenth of that amount. Fleischmann, meanwhile, told The Banner he is withholding his pay during the shutdown, but he, like Blackburn, also…

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Commentary: Contrary to Some Conservatives’ Slavish Devotion Free Trade Dogma, Trade Deficits Do Matter

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by Spencer P. Morrison   Steve Hanke recently set out to prove “why President Trump’s trade message and protectionist policies are rubbish” in a Forbes article. Instead, the Johns Hopkins University economist exposed himself as a word-mincing, logic-twisting sophist – just like every other intellectual mercenary associated with the faux-libertarian propaganda mill that is the Cato Institute. Hanke’s argument: trade deficits don’t exist, China is not screwing America, and President Trump (the village idiot) is jousting windmills. The real problem is lazy Americans who shop-til-they-drop and demand welfare “gimmies” from Uncle Sam. Faust’s Bargain Hanke begins his argument by explaining that trade deficits don’t really exist. Instead, the goods trade deficit is simply one half of the equation: In economics, identities play an important role. These identities are obtained by equating two different breakdowns of a single aggregate. Identities are interesting, and usually important, by definition. In national income accounting, the following identity can be derived. It is the key to understanding the trade deficit. (Imports – Exports ) ≡ (Investment – Savings) + (Government Spending – Taxes) Given this identity, which must hold, the trade deficit is equal to the excess of private sector investment over savings, plus the excess of government spending over tax revenue.…

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Netflix Show Attempts to Revive NC ‘Bathroom Bill’ Fight As 2020 Approaches

A.P. Dillon
Netflix

A Netflix show appears to be attempting to revive the atmosphere of corporate activism, economic blackmail, and political point scoring seen during the 2016 fight over North Carolina’s House Bill 2 – also known as the ‘Bathroom Bill’. Jonas Pate, the creator of the Netflix show OBX, has threatened to take filming of 10 episodes of the show to Charleston, South Carolina because of a provision in the repeal bill for House Bill 2 (HB2). Netflix as a company has yet to comment on Pate’s position. The repeal bill (House Bill 142) has a provision placing a moratorium on municipalities passing local ordinances. The moratorium sunset date falls after the 2020 elections, which makes it difficult to revive HB2 and House Bill 142 as a political wedge issue. Pate’s choice of Charleston is likely intentional, as it is one of only two cities in South Carolina that has a public accommodations ordinance that includes, “perceived heterosexuality, homosexuality or bisexuality or gender identity or expression.” South Carolina as a whole received a ‘failing grade’ from the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) in their 2018 Municipality Equality Index.  By contrast, Netflix received a perfect score of 100 on HRC’s 2018 corporate equality index report. Pate…

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Chicago Mayoral Candidate Wants to Sue Indiana and Wisconsin to Stop Gun Violence

Anthony Gockowski

Chicago mayoral candidate Gery Chico, a Democrat, recently suggested that he would sue the states of Indiana and Wisconsin in an effort to curb gun violence in his city. During a Thursday candidate’s forum, Chico said that “we have to get these illegal guns off our streets.” “The gang-bangers that are committing crimes with guns are out of control, and what we’re finding is that more than 60 percent of the guns used in these crimes are coming from over the border. I’ve said that if we can’t get Indiana and Wisconsin to work with us, we sue them, and that includes the Cabela’s gun shop right in Indiana—right in Hammond, Indiana. We can no longer take this,” Chico elaborated. Those numbers stem from a 2017 Gun Trace Report conducted by the Chicago Police Department in collaboration with Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s office and the University of Chicago Crime Lab. The report found that 21 percent of firearms recovered in crimes came from Indiana, while four percent were from Wisconsin. 40 percent, however, came from within Illinois, while another five percent were from Mississippi. Additionally, the report found that two Illinois-based firearms stores produced the most guns recovered in crimes, while the…

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In Unique Midnight Ceremony, Mike DeWine Sworn in as Governor of Ohio

Andrew Shirley

If his first day in office is any gauge of his coming term of office, Governor DeWine will have an unprecedented tenure. DeWine is not the first executive to be sworn in on more than one Bible. As recently as 2017, President Donald Trump was sworn in on two; a common practice. When Mike DeWine was sworn in as Governor of Ohio, he was sworn in on nine. Nine Bibles. At 12:01 A.M., Mike DeWine took his oath of office at his family home in Cedarville. Ohio Supreme Court Justice Pat DeWine, his son, administered the oath with all nine Bibles. When asked why nine, a spokesperson stated that the family wanted one for each of their eight children, in addition to theirs. Immediately following the ceremony, the 72-year-old Ohioan, signed six separate Executive Orders, crossing a wide array of issues. They are: E.O. 2019-01D: Creating the Governor’s RecoveryOhio Initiative, This creates a special task force that will oversee the statewide battle against the Opioid Epidemic. Leading the group as his “Drug-Czar” is  Alisha Nelson, who has served in the capacity under DeWine when he was Attorney General, E.O. 2019-02D: Creating the Governor’s Children’s Initiative, Ohio has one of the highest childhood…

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Minnesota’s Betty McCollum Introduces Constitutional Amendment to Make Health Care a Right

Anthony Gockowski

Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN-04) recently introduced an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would make health care a right for all American citizens. The Health Care for All Amendment, H.J. Res. 17, is currently co-sponsored by Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI-02) and states “health care, including care to prevent and treat illness, is the right of the people and necessary to ensure the strength of the nation.” “The Congress shall have power to enforce and implement this article by appropriate legislation,” the amendment states. In a press release announcing the amendment, McCollum bashed “the Trump administration and Congressional Republicans” for “actively and intentionally sabotaging our health care system,” while stating that “pharmaceutical companies are gouging consumers to extract huge profits.” “Strengthening the Affordable Care Act, expanding federal Medicare and Medicaid programs, protecting women’s reproductive rights, and working to build a system of universal health coverage are some of the steps Congress must take to ensure that the American people have the assurance and stability they deserve when it comes to receiving health care,” McCollum said. She went on to lament the treatment of health care as “a commodity driven by profit” that should not have to “be restricted or rationed according…

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Job Slashing Hedge Fund Bids to Buy Gannett and The Tennessean: Management ‘Has Not Demonstrated That It’s Capable of Effectively Running This Enterprise’

Tennessee Star Staff

Hedge fund backed Digital First Media, which owns more than 200 newspapers and is known for its draconian cost cutting and job slashing, submitted a bid to buy Gannett for $1.3 billion on Monday. “Critics have described Alden as a “destroyer of newspapers” that is prone to “savage” layoffs and as “one of the most ruthless of the corporate strip-miners seemingly intent on destroying local journalism,” the New York Times reported after news of the bid broke. Gannett, a publicly traded company, owns USA Today and 100 other newspapers, including The Tennessean in Nashville, the Commercial Appeal in Memphis, and the Knoxville News Sentinel. In its bid, Digital First Media delivered a withering assessment of the competence of Gannett’s current management team in this letter accompanying the bid: Gannett has lost 41% of its value since its debut as a public company two and a half years ago, significantly underperforming its peer group and indices.  During this period, Gannett suffered from a series of value-destroying decisions made by an unfocused leadership team – overpaying for a string of non-core aspirational digital deals and pursuing an ill-fated hostile for Tribune Publishing, all while Gannett’s core revenue, EBITDA, margins and Free Cash Flow continue…

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Tennessee Church Recently Blasted by PETA Might Consider New Contest Lampooning the Group

Chris Butler

A new contest that allows people to judge the most repulsive and offensive ads PETA puts out might amuse members of Nashville’s Cornerstone Church. As FOX News reported last year, PETA, short for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, blasted church officials for using wild animals in one of its sermons. This week PETAKillsAnimals.com launched a new contest where people get to vote on the dumbest PETA marketing campaign. “Participants have a chance to win a 12-month subscription to a meat delivery service,” according to a press release the group put out. “Since its conception, the animal liberation group PETA has run countless marketing campaigns designed to shock and repulse the public. Among others, our contest highlights PETA’s controversial comparison of Holocaust victims and chickens as well as PETA’s recent, widely ridiculed attempt to change common idioms such as ‘bring home the bacon.’” People who vote can choose ads that trivialize the holocaust or make light of sexual violence, the group said. “There are 10 campaigns to choose from in the contest going back decades. PETA’s campaigns include tasteless Holocaust comparisons, attempting to rebrand fish as ‘sea kittens,’ and PETA’s recent headline-grabbing criticism of common idioms,” according to PETAKillsAnimals.com As FOX News reported, Cornerstone Nashville church officials used…

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Commentary: Trump Is Right, Congress Needs to Do Its Job

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by Rachel Bovard   As the partial government shutdown enters its third week with little hope of an end in sight, President Trump continues to demand funding for a southern border wall. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) flat out refuses to pass any funding at all. In the Senate, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has washed his hands of the matter, telling Trump to work it out with Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) while he moves the Senate onto other topics. Predictably, both chambers clocked out for the weekend on Thursday afternoon. When senators and House members make the rounds on the upcoming Sunday shows wringing their hands about the shutdown, somebody might ask why they only worked less than three days this week. Apparently, the crisis at the border, and the resulting government shutdown, are an emergency to everyone except the people responsible for addressing it. In the face of congressional intransigence, President Trump has toyed with the idea of declaring a national emergency. On Friday, the president said that option was currently off the table, and with good reason. Although funding the wall through an emergency declaration is likely legal, it would create more problems for the president than it solves, both politically and practically.…

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Report: Job Slashing Hedge Fund Looking to Buy The Tennessean as Part of Gannett Purchase

Tennessee Star Staff

The Wall Street Journal and Market Watch are reporting that Digital First Media, a hedge fund backed media company renowned for purchasing newspapers and gutting the operations through firings and drastic cost cutting, is preparing a bid to purchase Gannett, which owns The Tennessean, along with about 100 other newspapers around the country. Market Watch reported on Sunday: A hedge-fund-backed media group known for buying up struggling local papers and cutting costs is planning to make an offer for USA Today publisher Gannett Co., according to people familiar with the matter. MNG Enterprises Inc., one of the largest newspaper chains in the country, has quietly built a 7.5% position in Gannett’s stock and plans to publicly urge the McLean, Va., publisher to put itself up for sale, the people said. MNG, better known as Digital First Media, will also offer to buy Gannett GCI, +0.52% for $12 a share, they said, which would represent a 23% premium over Friday’s closing price of $9.75. The shares, which fell steeply last year, have been rising lately. Closely held Digital First is known for its contentious history with the newspaper industry in part because of its penchant for slashing costs. It has over…

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Georgia’s Failed Gubernatorial Candidate Stacey Abrams Meets with Chuck Schumer as 2020 Senate Speculation Mounts

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by Jason Hopkins   Failed Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams met with top Democratic leadership in Washington, D.C., this week to discuss a potential run for the Senate in 2020. Abrams held talks Thursday with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Nevada Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, the chairwoman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. The discussion comes as Abrams, considered the unofficial leader of Georgia Democrats, mulls her next political moves. The former state representative and romance novelist rocketed to fame during her 2018 gubernatorial bid against Republican Brian Kemp, the state’s former secretary of state. National Democrats had hoped Abrams would make history as the first black female to be elected governor of a U.S. state. However, Kemp ultimately emerged victorious in what was one of the closest elections in Georgia history. The contest also became one of the state’s ugliest campaigns in recent memory. Despite publicly admitting she wouldn’t receive enough votes to force an election runoff, Abrams refused to use the word “concession” because it, according to her, would denote a meaning of “right, true or proper.” She has continued to claim, without evidence, that Kemp used his secretary of state position to maliciously suppress voters and refuses to…

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Tennessee State Lawmakers Eye Penalties for Shelby County Defiance of New Law on Illegal Aliens

Chris Butler

Tennessee’s top political leaders are reportedly rebuking Memphis for not going along with a new law to detain illegal immigrants for federal officials. As The Tennessee Star reported, Shelby County officials say they won’t cooperate with a new Tennessee law that helps federal officials detain and deport illegal aliens. The state law took effect Jan. 1. Senate Speaker Randy McNally and House Speaker Glen Casada are unhappy, according to The Associated Press. “Shelby County needs to reevaluate their position,” McNally said in a statement. “As outlined in the law, continued refusal will result in the forfeit of state economic and community development grants which would negatively affect the local economy in Shelby County.” The law threatens local governments with the loss of future state economic and community development money if they have sanctuary policies. Federal immigration officials have the power to deport illegal aliens arrested on other charges. But some local laws have kept those local law enforcement officers from cooperating with the feds. The new law bans those local policies. That includes barring local policies that require federal officials to obtain a warrant or show probable cause beforehand. As The Tennessee Star reported last fall, county officials, specifically the folks at…

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Nebraska State Senator Joni Albrecht Introduces Bill Mandating Clinics Tell Women About Abortion Reversal Pill

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by Grace Carr   The Nebraska Legislature is considering mandating doctors inform women seeking medication abortions that the abortive process can be reversed, after a state senator introduced a bill to the state legislature Friday. Nebraska Sen. Joni Albrecht introduced a bill requiring doctors to inform women that they can reverse their abortion if they choose not to go through with the medication abortion midway through the process, ABC7 reported Saturday. The abortion reversal pill aims to reverse the effects of a chemically induced abortion within the first 24 hours of taking mifepristone or RU-486 by flooding the woman’s body with progesterone, according to the abortion reversal pill’s website. Abortion reversal has a 55 percent success rate of saving pregnancies, according to the site. The American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists maintains, however, that there is no medically accepted evidence saying “abortion reversal” is legitimate. “Every day I wake up so grateful for my second chance at choice and that’s exactly what this bill provides for women,” 24-year-old Rebekah Hagan said, applauding the bill, ABC7 reported. Medication abortions account for 55 percent of abortions in Nebraska, according to the Lincoln Journal Star. The proposal comes after Idaho passed a bill in May requiring doctors to provide women seeking medicinal abortions with information telling…

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Tennessee Amusement Tax Punishes Small Business, NFIB Says

Chris Butler

If you own a small gym in Tennessee then state officials force you to pay what is called an amusement tax, and that’s especially bad for the state’s overall physical health, according to a business expert. Large gym owners don’t have to pay this tax. Small business owners must pass the higher costs of doing business down to their customers. The tax amounts to about 10 percent, said Jim Brown, Tennessee director of the National Federation of Independent Business. Tennessee officials used the amusement tax to take about $16 million out of the economy and put it in state coffers last year, Brown told The Tennessee Star. The Volunteer State, Brown went on to say, is not among the healthiest of the 50 states. Tennessee, for instance, ranks as the nation’s sixth most unhealthy state, according to a 2017 Tennessean article. And this tax discourages people from getting in shape. That’s why Brown said he and other grassroots groups plan to push hard to do away with the tax this new legislative session. “We can talk a lot about health care reform, but we don’t talk enough about health reform. This is excellent tax reform that is health reform,” Brown…

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Government Agency Run By Obama Holdovers Reportedly Paid Staff Despite Not Having Money During Shutdown

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by Tim Pearce   Employees at a federal agency run by Obama holdovers received paychecks Friday despite having no federal money appropriated to do so, according emails obtained by The Daily Caller News Foundation. Staff at the Chemical Safety Board (CSB) received an email Friday morning explaining that they had all received paychecks deposited into their bank accounts by mistake. CSB officials are working with the Interior Business Center (IBC), a federal shared services provider that handles payroll for dozens of agencies, to correct the mistake. “Folks, if you check your bank account this morning, you are likely to find that you were paid. As I reported to you last night, IBC made an error in processing the payroll for Pay Period 1 and no staff, furloughed or exempt, should have been paid. PLEASE DO NOT ACCESS THE FUNDS. We are working with IBC to determine how to remedy this situation and it is best if you don’t access the funds,” an email, sent staff-wide from a generic agency account, said. The email was sent by Thomas Zoeller, the CSB’s senior adviser and acting general counsel, according to a source familiar with the payroll error. During a government shutdown, federal employees fall into…

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Ted Cruz Calls Out Tim Kaine For Putting Politics Over His Constituency

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by Molly Prince   Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz criticized his Democratic colleague Sen. Tim Kaine on Sunday for holding a large portion of his constituency hostage in order to advance his party’s political agenda. “You’ve got my friend Tim Kaine coming on [‘Meet The Press’] in a minute, he represents Virginia,” Cruz told host Chuck Todd. “There are a lot of federal workers in the commonwealth of Virginia.” “If Tim Kaine and [fellow Virginia Sen.] Mark Warner were to say ‘We’re going to put the jobs of the men and women of Virginia ahead of our partisan interests, ahead of the fact that our base hates [President] Donald Trump,’ it would take only five more Democrats in the Senate to have the votes to say this second ‘Schumer Shutdown’ is over, we’re reopening the government and we’re going to implement common sense border security that the American people want,” Cruz continued. The Republican-led House passed a stopgap funding bill on Dec. 20 that included appropriations to construct a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. However, with a 51-seat majority, Senate Republicans fell short of the necessary 60 votes needed to send it to Trump’s desk for signature. Consequently, a government shutdown has been in effect…

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Company Accused of Screwing Up TNReady Wants Another Chance

Chris Butler

Tennessee auditors may have recently put out a rotten review of how Questar Assessment, Inc. handled TNReady, but that is reportedly not discouraging company officials. According to the Chattanooga-based WRCBtv.com, Questar officials want the job again. Specifically, they want a new state contract to continue overseeing the same service in the fall. They will bid for it, the website reported. As The Tennessee Star reported last month, the TNReady online student assessment tests had login delays, slow servers, and software bugs, according to an audit Tennessee Comptrollers released. As reported, last year Republican Gov. Bill Haslam said TNReady “has had several hiccups” and that criticism of it “was earned.” Auditors, however, went into more detail in their report. “The first signs of trouble began on April 16, 2018 and continued through the end of the month,” auditors said in a press release. “Auditors determined that many of these issues occurred primarily because of Questar Assessment, Inc’s performance and updates to the student assessment system. Auditors also found the Department of Education’s oversight of test administration fell short of expectations.” Over the course of the audit, the department and Questar worked constantly to address the issues that caused or contributed to the spring…

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Commentary: Dump The National Emergencies Act

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by Julie Kelly   One of the more revelatory aspects of the Trump era is how the national media, after taking an extended nap between 2009 and 2017, now are very worried about constitutional overreach by the executive branch. Presidential power-grabs – which were super cool just five years ago when Barack Obama threatened to use “a pen and a phone” to work around a Republican-controlled legislative branch – suddenly went out of style in January 2017. Obama needed to take unilateral action as a last resort, the media argued, because of those big, bad Republicans. “Blocked for most of his presidency by Congress, Obama has sought to act however he could,” lamented the New York Times in August 2016. “In the process he created the kind of government neither he nor the Republicans wanted – one that depended on bureaucratic bulldozing rather than legislative transparency.” But it was for our own good, insisted the Times. “An army of lawyers working under Obama’s authority has sought to restructure the nation’s health care and financial industries, limit pollution, bolster workplace protections and extend equal rights to minorities. Under Obama, the government has literally placed a higher value on human life.” Thanks, Obama! The former president often defended himself…

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Trump Predicts DACA Will Bring Hispanic Voters ‘Over to the Republican Side’ Amid Shutdown Stalemate

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by Evie Fordham   President Donald Trump predicted Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) could become a larger factor in his border wall funding fight during a flurry of tweets Sunday morning. “Democrats are saying that DACA is not worth it and don’t want to include in talks,” Trump wrote on Twitter. “Many Hispanics will be coming over to the Republican side, watch!” Democrats are saying that DACA is not worth it and don’t want to include in talks. Many Hispanics will be coming over to the Republican side, watch! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 13, 2019 Trump continued to call out Democrats for punting on negotiations to end the shutdown, perhaps referring to the roughly 30 Democratic lawmakers reportedly attending a retreat with lobbyists in Puerto Rico, according to the Washington Examiner. “I’m in the White House, waiting. The Democrats are everywhere but Washington as people await their pay. They are having fun and not even talking!” he wrote. I’m in the White House, waiting. The Democrats are everywhere but Washington as people await their pay. They are having fun and not even talking! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 13, 2019 Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Republicans need to “abandon”…

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Minnesota Receives ‘C’ Grade From Center for Education Reform, Cautions Against Walz’s ‘Authoritarian’ Approach

Anthony Gockowski
students in class

Minnesota received an overall C grade in parent empowerment on the Center for Education Reform’s annual Parent Power Index, which factors school choice, charter schools, personalized learning, teacher quality, and transparency into its grading system. With two school-choice programs, Minnesota received an F grading in the area of school choice, but still managed to score above the national average. Only one state, Florida, received an A for its school choice programs. Minnesota currently offers a K-12 Education Credit, which is an individual tax credit program that “offers families refundable tax credits for non-tuition educational expenses like tutoring, educational after-school programs and books.” The state also offers an Education Deduction program that allows “parents to deduct educational expenses, including tuition, tutoring, books, and more.” Overall, Minnesota ranked fourth on the Parent Power Index, which states that “only a lack of private school choice prevents this star from rising as high as it could.” “Like its North Star name suggests, Minnesota is truly a stellar state for education innovation. It was the first state to pass a charter school law, and it is now at the forefront of digital and personalized learning. Minnesota also offers many choices for high school students to…

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Ohio School Voucher Program Doubles as More Public Schools Fail to Make The Grade

Andrew Shirley

After a staggering number of Ohio public schools failed to make the grade, the state’s voucher and charter school system is poised for tremendous expansion. In Ohio, if the public school test scores of a student’s home district fall below a certain level, calculated by the Ohio Department of Education, a number of the students are automatically granted vouchers to attend private school and charter schools are permitted to establish themselves. This is intended to both give children from every country access to quality schools and alleviate the student burden on the lagging school.  The public schools performed so poorly that charter schools will have 600 times more areas to expand into, and student access to vouchers will more than double. Teacher unions and many in the progressive activist community have aggressively opposed both school voucher programs and charter schools. They argue that these programs siphon off funding from the already financially strained school system. In addition, a number of private schools in Ohio were founded as religious institutions. While none can legally force children to engage in religious activity against their will, progressives maintain that as they are still religiously-oriented, it is a violation of the ‘separation church and state.’ Ironically, it was an…

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Minnesota Democrat Says Most People Calling His Office Support ‘The Wall’

Anthony Gockowski

Democratic Rep. Collin Peterson (D-MN-07) told Fox News that the overwhelming majority of calls his office is receiving are from constituents who support President Donald Trump’s border wall. “From what I can tell, they’re still hanging with the president. Today, we got 67 calls for building the wall and five against. So, sounds to me like he’s still pretty popular,” Peterson said in an interview last week. This week, @collinpeterson admitted that both President @realDonaldTrump and the wall are popular in Minnesota. #BuildTheWall #mn07 pic.twitter.com/6xS9M7NKKr — Republican Party of Minnesota (@mngop) January 11, 2019 In another interview with Bloomberg, Peterson revealed that he’s not actually opposed to Trump’s wall, and said he believes Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “should negotiate.” During Trump’s Tuesday night Oval Office address, he urged every American citizen to “call Congress and tell them to finally, after all of these decades, secure our border.” “This is a choice between right and wrong. Justice and injustice. This is about whether we fulfill our sacred duty to the American citizens we serve,” Trump said. Vice President Mike Pence echoed those sentiments in an interview on The Rush Limbaugh Show, where he too pleaded…

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Veteran Says Mainstream Media Reports Claiming End to Border Wall Fundraiser are ‘Blatantly False,’ More Than $20 Million Raised

Jason M. Reynolds

Purple Heart veteran Brian Kolfage came out swinging against the mainstream news media over the weekend after multiple outlets falsely sounded the death knell of his border wall fundraiser and attacked his honesty. The triple amputee veteran took to Twitter and at least one other outlet to refute false reports that GoFundMe would refund $20 million collected for the wall because Kolfage’s goal had not been met or that he was funneling the money elsewhere. The media campaigns used half-truths to question the honesty of Kolfage, who has been transparent in changing his goal from giving the donations to the shut-down government to build the wall to instead planning to use the money in a nonprofit to buy land on the border and build the wall faster and more inexpensively. Kolfage said on a video on his website that to counter the Democrats – who do not want the wall – he changed his charity’s mission, and gave it the name “We Build the Wall.” The GoFundMe page is here, and shows donations of all amounts continuing to pour in at more than $20.4 million. Kolfage says people who donated before Jan. 11 can either receive a refund or opt-in…

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Tennessee Voters Make Good on Donald Trump Call to Action on Border Standoff

Chris Butler

Tennessee Republican Congressman Phil Roe reportedly said people are calling his office in record numbers to discuss the federal government shutdown and the proposed wall along the U.S. and Mexican border President Donald Trump wants. As the Little Rock-based KARK TV station reported this week, Trump urged Americans to contact their representatives in Washington, D.C. and tell them they support his fight for a border wall. The station contacted congressmen and U.S. senators from Arkansas and Tennessee to gauge whether Trump’s call to action was having an effect. Roe, the station went on to say, supports the proposed wall, especially after “he saw the need firsthand during a trip to the border last summer.” “We have drug introduction. We have sexual trafficking. We have human trafficking,” KARK quoted Roe as saying. Arkansas Republican U.S. Senator Tom Cotton said his office was “jam-packed” with calls also, but that most of the people calling wanted to talk about the government shutdown. The station also interviewed U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Memphis. Cohen told the station very few people were calling his office and that those who did complained about the government shutdown. Last week Vice President Mike Pence called into the Rush Limbaugh…

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Dr. Carol M. Swain Commentary: White Officer’s Defense is Not Comparable to Nuremberg

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by Dr. Carol M. Swain   How we talk about race does matter: Leaders have a responsibility to avoid fanning the flames of racism for political advantage, such as what’s happening in Nashville, Tennessee, where a familiar national story is repeating itself. You know the storyline by now: A white police officer shoots and kills a black man who is running away from the officer—it’s a multiple tragedy on several fronts. The national media then goes overboard in reporting the story, as in this case with the likes of Newsweek and The New York Times among those amping up coverage of the Nashville shooting. It’s a tragedy for the deceased, Daniel Hambrick, 25, and his family, which going forward is denied his presence and fellowship. It’s a tragedy for the Nashville community and for America as a whole, as well as for Andrew Delke, the 25-year-old police officer who fired the fatal shots. It’s also a tragedy for the city and nation when Glenn Funk, the prosecutor in the case, decided to use incendiary and hyperbolic language at a preliminary hearing about whether criminal charges against the officer will advance. Not hesitant to demonstrate his foolishness, Funk argued that Delke’s…

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U.S. Rep. Mark Green Discusses First Two Weeks in Congress, Chides Democrats for Shutdown and Failure to Protect Border

Jason M. Reynolds

Freshman U.S. Rep. Dr. Mark Green (R-TN-07) provided an update on his first two weeks in Congress in a Facebook video Saturday. The video is available here on Facebook. The transcript follows. “It has been emotional to say the least,” Green said. “I raised my hand and I took the oath – the same oath that I took at West Point when I was 17 years old. I just thank the people of the Seventh Congressional District who gave me the opportunity to once again serve our great nation. “It’s been a challenging two weeks. The government is still shut down. We have federal employees that aren’t getting paid because the Democrats won’t give us 5.7 billion dollars to protect our southern border. Money that they voted on before in the past. Money that they’ve all been quoted saying was needed in the past. And they’re just ignoring the human suffering in our country from things like heroin addiction and overdose and death, the murders. Lindsey Graham  said it the other day – at least our federal employees will get back pay, but the wife of Officer Singh will not get her husband back. “It’s a national crisis. We’ve got…

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Report Highlights the Crazy Lengths Hackers Took to Hack US Utilities

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by Chris White   Russian hackers went to shocking and elaborate lengths to wriggle their way into the United States’ electrical grid, according to a Wall Street Journal report Friday that detailed a slew of hacking techniques. Hackers targeted government contractors connected to a public utility company in Oregon to access the country’s electric grid, the report notes. Some of the contractors were unaware they were victimized due to the exotic tactics hackers used to disguise their intentions. The scheme’s success is owed mostly to how it exploited trusted business relationships using impersonation and trickery. Hackers planted malware on sites utility engineers frequently visit and sent phony résumés with tainted attachments. After getting credentials, they then slipped through portals and gained access to computer systems that monitor and control electricity flows. WSJ’s report identified government contractors such as Commercial Contractors in Washington, and Carlson Testing in Oregon, among other big-name public utilities who were targeted in 2017. One of the cite’s contractors visited cleaned-out malicious malware from its domains in 2016 only to see hackers return and infect the system again. Hackers seized on unsuspecting visitors and other trade websites, hoping to lure engineers and penetrate the companies where they…

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Republican Senators Introduce Legislation That Would ‘Permanently Prevent’ Government Shutdowns

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by Henry Rodgers   A group of Republican Senators introduced legislation Friday that would permanently prevent the federal government from ever shutting down. Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman, Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, Montana Sen. Steve Daines, Georgia Sen. Johnny Isakson, Wyoming Sen. Mike Enzi, Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, Idaho Sen. Jim Risch, Utah Sen. Mike Lee, and Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski introduced the legislation – the “End Government Shutdowns Act,” which will make it so the federal government can never shutdown. This comes as the government has been partially shutdown for 21 days. Republican members of Congress have lobbied members of Congress to reach an agreement on a bill that would fund the government and protect the border. “It’s disappointing that both sides didn’t resolve this matter weeks ago. Shutdowns inevitably costs taxpayers more money once the government reopens. I hope that both parties come together and reach an agreement that brings a resolution to this issue as quickly as possible,” Portman said in a statement. “Moving forward, we should end government shutdowns for good. This bipartisan legislation will accomplish that goal, providing lawmakers with more time to reach a responsible resolution to budget negotiations, giving federal workers and…

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Daines Introduces Bill Withholding Pay from Congressmen During Government Shutdowns, Others Join

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by Henry Rodgers   Republican Montana Sen. Steve Daines introduced a bill on the Senate floor Thursday that would withhold the pay of members of Congress during future government shutdowns. Daines’s introduction of the bill, sponsored by Republican Texas Sen. John Cornyn, comes hours after Daines announced he sent a letter requesting the secretary of the U.S. Senate withhold his pay during the ongoing partial shutdown of the federal government. “Members of Congress are sent to Washington, D.C., to represent the great people of their state and keep the federal government open, working and funded. So it’s simple. If they can’t do that, they shouldn’t get paid. No work, no pay,” Daines told The Daily Caller News Foundation after the bill was introduced. The “No Work, No Pay Act,” introduced by Daines, would make it so members of Congress would not be paid if they cannot keep the government funded. His move to not accept pay was followed by many of his colleagues, such as Cornyn, who said he was excited to join Daines in co-sponsoring the bill. He echoed Daines’s message that members of Congress should not be paid while government agencies are shut down. Pleased to join my…

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US Granted Over 5,000 Requests to Bring in Child Brides From Foreign Nationals

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by Joshua Gill   The U.S. approved more than 5,000 requests by men to bring child or adolescent brides into the country over the past decade, enabling forced child marriages. U.S. immigration authorities approved 5,556 requests from older men to bring child or adolescent wives to the U.S., and approved 2,926 requests from young girls to bring their older husbands to the U.S. between the budget years of 2007 and 2017. The data also revealed 4,749 minor spouses or fiancees had received U.S. green cards in that time period. The highest percentage of requests came from Middle Eastern nationals, with the majority of requests coming from Mexico, followed by Pakistan, Jordan, the Dominican Republic and Yemen. The requests and their approvals were apparently legal, according to government data obtained by The Associated Press, due to the fact that the Immigration and Nationality Act does not limit the age of spouses. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services also approves or denies requests based on whether the marriage is legal in the home country and the state of the applicant. Republican Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, said the approvals highlight a legal loophole in which, contrary to…

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Commentary: Establishment Republicans Want the Pro-Life Movement Dead

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by Deion A. Kathawa   Just a few days before Christmas, departing Ohio Governor John Kasich decided to play a disappointing Santa and put a massive lump of coal in the pro-life movement’s stocking. He vetoed a bill that would have made it a felony for a doctor to perform an abortion after a fetal heartbeat is detected. Mercifully, he did at least sign a second bill which bans the most common second-trimester abortion procedure, the dilation and evacuation—“D&E”—also called a “dismemberment” abortion, during which a fetus is ripped apart and extracted piece by piece. Is any political constituency as regularly swindled and abused as are pro-lifers? From their promises to defund Planned Parenthood to their assurances that Roe v. Wade is very soon to be on the chopping block, establishment Republicans are masters at talking a big game but doing nothing at all to advance the right to life of the unborn. Too many Republican politicians either are cynical grifters or outright liars who don’t care a whit about the 14th Amendment’s promise of “equal protection of the laws” to all persons or the Declaration’s teaching that “all men are created equal” and “are endowed by their Creator with…

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Commentary: Better Ways to Fight Extremism in Syria Than Endless War

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by Austin Mulka   Yesterday I posted a status in unequivocal support of President Trump’s recent decision to pull out of Syria. The post elicited the abhorrent wails of the president’s purported supporters, one of whom denounced me as a supporter of “child killers.” As baseless as the claim was, empathizing with an opponent’s argument is the most efficient means of coming to mutual understandings of disagreement. Ultimately, those in opposition to pulling out of Syria firmly believe that military intervention is a principled position against the murder of children. As such, any opposition to this position, such as my own, must indicate its reciprocal support. Insofar as I am unequivocally against the murder of children, I hope to explain why military intervention is not the most effective means of fighting the Islamic regime and three alternatives to war with proven effectiveness. Journalism First and foremost, I would like to state that I am not a supporter of the Islamic regime in Syria. In The Home That was Our Country: A Memoir of Syria, Arab-American journalist Alia Malek details her first-hand accounts of horrendous acts and grievances by the Syrian regime. Having lived in both Syria and the United States,…

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Group Behind Ocasio-Cortez’s ‘Green New Deal’ Wields Influence in Washington

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by Jason Hopkins   A recent profile identified several progressive institutions funding the Sunrise Movement, a nascent environmentalist organization that is quickly wielding influence in Washington, D.C. Founded in April 2017, the Sunrise Movement is a newcomer among the many green organizations that have already been established for generations. However, the youth-led climate group quickly garnered national attention and high-dollar donations from across the country. Between its 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) entities, the group was able to raise just shy of $1 million during 2018 — and members intend to raise $2.5 million in 2019. Despite growing attention from the media, it’s been difficult to pinpoint exactly who is funding the Sunrise Movement. The group is not legally required to disclose its donors. However, a recent report from Inside Philanthropy, an outlet focused on philanthropic groups and their big donors, sheds some light. The Rockefeller Fund, the Wallace Global Fund and the Winslow Foundation are core funders of Sunrise Movement. The three groups have continued to finance a large portion of Sunrise’s operations, with institutional funders making up 55 percent of the group’s 2018 budget. Thirty-five percent of its budget came from individual donors, and the rest came from non-profit partners.…

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Florida’s DeSantis Suspends Sheriff After Poor Response to Parkland Shooting

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by Neetu Chandak   Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis officially suspended Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel on Friday after his poor response to the Parkland high school shooting Feb. 14, 2018. Effective immediately, I am officially suspending Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel for his repeated failures, incompetence and neglect of duty. https://t.co/tkHzxTHhjH — Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) January 11, 2019 “Effective immediately, I am officially suspending Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel for his repeated failures, incompetence and neglect of duty,” DeSantis tweeted Friday. Israel reportedly told his officers he was suspended, but DeSantis had not announced any such decision, The Daily Caller previously reported. Calls to suspend the sheriff were immediate after the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission released a report detailing the failures that happened the day of the shooting. Revelations included police not going after suspected gunman Nikolas Cruz in a timely manner and chaotic radio communication, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported. Seventeen people died on the day of the massacre. – – – Neetu Chandak is a reporter for the Daily Caller News Foundation. Follow Neetu on Twitter. Photo “Ron DeSantis” by Gage Skidmore. CC BY-SA 2.0.                …

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