Month: June 2020

Judge to Approve $58 Billion Plan to End PG&E Bankruptcy After Wildfires, Pay $25.5 Billion for Losses

The Associated Press

A federal judge on Friday said he was approving a $58 billion plan by the nation’s largest utility to end a contentious bankruptcy saga that began after Pacific Gas & Electric’s outdated equipment ignited wildfires in California that killed more than 100 people, wiped out entire towns and led the company to confess to crimes driven by its greed and neglect.

The decision by U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Dennis Montali clears the way for PG&E to pay $25.5 billion for losses from devastating fires in 2017 and 2018. The judge said he will sign the formal order confirming PG&E’s plan late Friday or Saturday after the company’s lawyers make a few minor revisions worked out during a two-hour hearing.

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‘Stunning’: William Barr Hits Establishment Media for ‘Bovine Silence’ on Collapsed Russiagate Narrative

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Attorney General William Barr hit the establishment media in an interview aired Sunday for what he called its “bovine silence” regarding the debunked narrative of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian government.

In an interview on “Fox Sunday Futures,” Barr also asserted that the various government investigations into the Trump campaign’s possible ties to Kremlin were the “closest we have come to an organized effort to push a president out of office” since the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

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While Confederate Statues Come Down, Other Symbols Targeted

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Spectators in North Carolina’s capital cheered Sunday morning as work crews finished the job started by protesters Friday night and removed a Confederate statue from the top of a 75-foot (232 meter) monument.

Across the country, a peaceful protest in Portland, Oregon, against racial injustice turned violent early Sunday after baton-wielding police used flash-bang grenades to disperse demonstrators throwing bottles, cans and rocks at sheriff’s deputies near downtown’s Justice Center.

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Commentary: On Being Pounded with Lies, Damned Lies, and More Damned Lies about ‘Systemic’ Racism in America

Admin

We all know the story of the Emperor’s New Clothes. It is not just a children’s story. Rather, it is an eternal story about human nature. If people are surrounded by a mass or a mob who speak nonsense as a Truth — with a capital “T” — then perfectly sensible people who internally know better will fall into line and babble the same “Truth.” For a reality check and sanity in the public arena, it ultimately often takes a little kid who simply has not been taught social conformity and political correctness to look and say, “But this ‘Truth’ simply is not true.”

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‘Racist’ Brigham Young Statue Vandalized at Namesake University

Admin

In yet another example of statues being vandalized on America’s college campuses, the namesake statue at Brigham Young University in Utah was vandalized with the word “racist” written across the monument in red paint, according to the campus newspaper, The Daily Universe.

Separately, a sign marking the location of the Abraham O. Smoot Administration Building was also splattered with a red “X.”

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Utah Teachers’ Union Offers Endorsement to Lt. Governor Following Veto of Special Ed Bill

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The biggest teachers’ union in Utah has offered its endorsement of incumbent Lieutenant Governor Spencer Cox after his administration vetoed a special education bill that the union opposed.

The bill in question was House Bill 332, introduced by state representative Mike Schultz (R-Utah). The main purpose of the bill was to provide greater funding to special needs programs across the state, and sought to do so by creating a new individual/corporate tax credit that would provide the funding for a new scholarship program for such students. This not only would provide more assistance for the roughly 80,000 students in the state classified as special needs, but would do so from a new source of revenue rather than diverting any more funds from the currently existing education budget.

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Rep. Doug Collins Calls for a Special Prosecutor in Rayshard Brooks Shooting

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In the midst of a hotly contested race for U.S. Senate, Rep. Doug Collins (R-GA-09) called on Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr to appoint a special prosecutor in the wake of murder charges by Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard – who is also facing a tough run-off election in August – in the death of Rayshard Brooks.

“Our founders intended for our justice system to be blind – blind to race, blind to socioeconomic status, and blind to politics,” Rep. Collins said in a statement. “While we seek justice for George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and the many lives lost, we cannot turn our backs on the majority of law enforcement officers who are simply doing their jobs and putting their lives on the line for us each and every day.”

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Commentary: The Church Collaborates in Its Own Destruction

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Pope Francis

One might think the Catholic Church would stand against the orgy of iconoclasm that we are witnessing across the country — toppled statues, defaced churches, and the like. But, no, the feeble voices of priests and bishops join the creepy chorus of the mob. In California, the mob has targeted statues of Junipero Serra, the saintly Franciscan who spread the faith through a system of missions. Where is the Church to protect the statues? Nowhere. In Ventura, where the mob demands the removal of a Serra statue in front of its city hall, the Church has gone along with it.

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DeWine Signs Student Religious Liberties Act Into Law

Anthony Gockowski

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine signed the Student Religious Liberties Act into law Friday, a bill that protects prayer and religious expression in public schools.

“No student should have to hide their faith just because they enter a public school. The Student Religious Liberties Act is carefully crafted to ensure school administrators can’t unfairly penalize students of all faiths, or no faith,” said Aaron Baer, president of Citizens for Community Values, one of twelve groups that testified in support of the bill.

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Trump Mocks ‘Stone-Cold Crazy’ Minneapolis Officials, Predicts ‘Big Victory’ in Minnesota: ‘They’ve Had It’

Anthony Gockowski

President Donald Trump described Minneapolis officials as “stone-cold crazy” during his return to the campaign trail Saturday night in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

The lawlessness of the “radical left” was a recurring theme of the president’s speech, and Minneapolis was a prime target.

“Our incredible success in rebuilding America stands in stark contrast to the extremism and destruction and violence of the radical left,” the president said early in his 90-minute address.

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One Man Dead, 11 People Wounded in Minneapolis Shooting

The Associated Press

A shooting in a popular Minneapolis nightlife area early Sunday left one man dead and 11 people wounded in a chaotic scene that sent people ducking into restaurants and other businesses for cover.

The shooting broke out shortly after midnight in the city’s trendy Uptown neighborhood, a nightlife hub with bars, restaurants and retail including Apple and Fjallraven stores.

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Citizens for Community Values Pushes Back Against Hit Piece in The Columbus Dispatch

Jason M. Reynolds

Citizens for Community Values is pushing back against a “blatantly biased” story in The Columbus Dispatch newspaper attacking them for working with the state to help people during the COVID-19 pandemic.

CCV says it is “Ohio’s Family Policy Council” and “We endeavor to create an Ohio where God’s blessings of life, family, and religious freedom are treasured, respected, and protected.”

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EXCLUSIVE: Carol Swain and Herman Cain Say Support for Trump is Growing

Laura Baigert

Former Vanderbilt University professor Dr. Carol Swain and former Presidential candidate Herman Cain both agreed that support for President Trump is growing and not just in the black community, in an exclusive interview with The Tennessee Star prior to the official start of the Trump rally in Tulsa Saturday.

Both are members of the Black Voices for Trump Advisory Board, which started out with about 35 members and has now expanded to about 50.  The Board includes other spiritual and social leaders such as Dr. Alveda King, Reverend C. L. Bryant, Deneen Borelli, Diamond and Silk and the Hodge Twins.  At the insistence of others, Cain said he serves as one of the Board’s co-chairs.

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Commentary: Individual Responsibility Is the Motivation of Fathers and Entrepreneurs

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Almost half a century separates us from May 1968 revolution, which derided bourgeois values and made the classical virtue of courage seem dubious, if not obsolete. Intellectuals of a Marxist persuasion, such as Eric Fromm, described the traditional family as a puritanical cage imprisoning the inquisitive spirit of the youth. Leftist propaganda minimized the bravery of American soldier, especially during the Vietnam War, and ridiculed the notion of personal risk or individual heroism.

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Massive Plot Stole Data from Google Users Who Downloaded Free Add-Ons to Chrome Web Browsers: Report

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A massive spyware effort targeted users of Google’s Chrome web browser extensions downloaded tens of millions of times, Reuters reported Thursday.

The people responsible for the spyware attacked users through 32 million downloads of extensions to Google’s web browser, and collected browsing history and other user data, researchers at Awake Security told Reuters. Google removed more than 70 malicious extensions after researchers alerted the company of the attack in May, the company said.

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The Tennessee Star’s Neil McCabe Interviewed by Politico for Story on Nation’s Division

Anthony Gockowski

Neil McCabe, the national correspondent for The Tennessee Star and Star News network, was interviewed by Politico last week for a front-page story on the nation’s division.

The article focused on Seattle’s Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, called CHAZ for short, which Politico described as a “microcosm of the culture wars.” The CHAZ was established by protesters earlier this month after law enforcement officers withdrew from the scene.

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Defund the Police Protestors Complain of Alleged Sexual Assault at Legislative Plaza

Chris Butler

The group of protestors who have overtaken Nashville’s Legislative Plaza and demand that government officials defund the police alleged this week that one man there sexually assaulted two of them.

Left-wing activist Justin Jones posted Facebook videos this week in which he and other protestors said they escorted an unidentified man off the premises. Jones and others alleged that the man assaulted two women. Some protestors said they supported the idea of the victims filing police reports. The victims ultimately chose not to do that, according to Jones’ videos.

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McDonald’s to Hire 260K People in the US as Pandemic Lockdowns Come to an End

Admin

McDonald’s plans to hire more than a quarter of a million people over the course of the summer as economic lockdowns continue to slow down, the company announced Thursday.

The restaurant chain will add 260,000 employees as it reopens dining rooms after shutting down amid lockdowns designed to slow the spread of the coronavirus, or COVID-19, according to the president of the company.

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Commentary: The Lockdowns Crushed Minority-Owned Businesses the Most

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Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, minorities have disproportionately suffered from the virus’s health effects. A new study reveals that the government-mandated economic lockdowns have also hit minorities hardest.

In response to the outbreak and under the guidance of federal agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control, state and local governments imposed quarantine orders and mandated shutdowns for many businesses deemed “non-essential.” Whether one supports lockdowns as a public health measure or not, they undoubtedly resulted in tens of millions of Americans and counting filing for unemployment and a sharp economic downturn.

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St. Junipero Serra Statue to Be Removed from California City

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The statue of a Roman Catholic saint, Junipero Serra, will be removed from public display over accusations that statues of the missionary reflect oppression of indigenous peoples, according to city officials.

The mayor of Ventura, California, representatives from the Barbareno/Venureno Band of Mission Indians, and a pastor of the Mission San Buenaventura issued a joint statement agreeing to take down a bronzed, 9-foot statue of Serra and have it “moved to a more appropriate non-public location” on Thursday, according to the Los Angeles Times.

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Report: U.S. Companies Adapting to Produce Coronavirus Supplies Will Reverse Globalization

Admin

Solvay, a polymer-specialist company in the mid-Ohio Valley with operations in Washington and Pleasants counties, has partnered with Paragon, a medical-supplies development company to create a special shield for health care workers.

Officials at Memorial Health System told local news outlets they are grateful for the new equipment and for the innovations of U.S. companies that have quickly manufactured necessary equipment needed in the fight against the coronavirus. They said they will continue to use the equipment even after the coronavirus subsides.

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Gov. Mike DeWine Condemns Protest That Vandalized Ohio Statehouse

Zachery Schmidt

Gov. Mike DeWine released a statement on Friday showing his displeasure with the recent vandalism at the Ohio Capitol.

“I have spoken with Ohio State Highway Patrol Col. Richard Fambro about security at the Statehouse, and I shared with him my anger and disgust at the vandalism that occurred at the Ohio Statehouse yesterday. I support the right to peacefully protest. However, defacing, damaging, and vandalizing our state capitol and its grounds are wrong, and such actions are criminal,” DeWine said.

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Republicans Say Gov. Walz Has Failed to Provide Legal Justification for Coronavirus Shutdown

Anthony Gockowski

Republican lawmakers who sued Gov. Tim Walz said Friday that he has failed to provide legal justification for his response to the coronavirus pandemic.

“We are winning on this issue, and Gov. Walz knows it,” said Rep. Jeremy Munson (R-Lake Crystal), one of 13 Republican lawmakers who joined a lawsuit against Walz over his use of emergency powers during the pandemic.

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Nashville’s Community Oversight Board Wants to Help Select Police Chief Steve Anderson’s Replacement

Chris Butler

  Members of Nashville’s Metro Community Oversight Board plan to help city officials find Nashville’s next police chief. “Following Mayor John Cooper’s announcement today of Chief Steve Anderson’s decision to retire as Chief of Police, the Community Oversight Board (COB) looks forward to being involved in the selection process of the city’s next Chief of Police,” COB members said in a press release this week. “The voice of the community must be reflected early and often during the national search and selection process, and the needs and values of the people of Nashville should be heavily considered and heard. The Community Oversight Board welcomes the invitation to be a member of the selection committee and is ready to continue the work that has been mandated by the Nashville community.” As The Tennessee Star reported this week, Anderson will retire in likely six months’ time. Nashville Mayor John Cooper announced this at a press conference Thursday — a conference that Anderson did not attend. This, as reported, after left-wing activists and Metro Council members pushed for either Anderson to resign or for Cooper to fire him. Time after time, reporters at Thursday’s press conference asked Cooper if he asked Anderson to retire. Cooper did not seem…

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Judge: Book May Proceed Despite Bolton’s Gambling with U.S. National Security

The Associated Press

A federal judge ruled Saturday that former national security adviser John Bolton can move forward in publishing his tell-all book despite efforts by the Trump administration to block the release because of concerns that classified information could be exposed.

The decision from U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth is a victory for Bolton in a court case that involved core First Amendment and national security concerns. But the judge also made clear his concerns that Bolton had “gambled with the national security of the United States” by taking it upon himself to publish his memoir without formal clearance from a White House that says it was still reviewing it for classified information.

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Hours Before Trump Rally in Tulsa, Crowd Swells to Thousands

Laura Baigert

TULSA, Oklahoma – In the overnight hours from Friday to Saturday morning, the crowd anticipating President Trump’s first rally since the outbreak of COVID-19 in Tulsa, swelled from hundreds to thousands.

Late Thursday evening, rally attendees numbering about 125 gathered along the one city block of West 4th Street between South Boulder and South Cheyenne Avenues some of whom had been there for nearly a week, The Tennessee Star reported.

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Commentary: Chief Justice Roberts Pushes Final DACA Decision Past 2020 Election

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The Supreme Court’s new Leftwing majority, led by the once allegedly conservative Chief Justice John Roberts, has issued two bizarre rulings this week, the latest being in the case of Department of Homeland Security et al. v. Regents of the University of California et al. which addressed the Trump administration’s effort to end the Obama Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.

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Gov. Lee Announces ‘Strong Mask Movement’ to Make Wearing Face Masks ‘Fun’

Anthony Gockowski

Gov. Bill Lee announced a new “TN Strong Mask Movement” Thursday with the goal of making face masks more “fun.”

According to a press release from the governor’s office, the Economic Recovery Group developed the new program along with more than 30 “flagship brands” across the state, including Amazon, Bridgestone, Bristol Motor Speedway, Graceland, Jack Daniel’s, several professional sports teams and universities, and many others.

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Steve Bannon Presents: Descent Into Hell

Admin

An all new LIVE STREAM of Descent Into Hell: The Crisis in Hong Kong starts at 9 a.m. Central Time on Saturday.

The two-hour special takes a closer look at the life of everyday Chinese citizens under the Chinese Communist Party and will air live on the John Fredericks Radio Network, America’s Voice Network, Dish TV Channel 219, The Epoch Times, ND TV, GTV and GNews in Mandarin.

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Commentary: The CHAZ Stands Alone

Admin

One of the more amusing spectacles of the recent protests has been the establishment of the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ)—now called the Capitol Hill Organized Protest (CHOP)—in the middle of downtown Seattle, Washington. Conservatives on social media have had a field day making light of the pint-sized experiment in neo-Marxist utopia. Contained within these few square blocks, however, is a microcosm of all the lies and failures of Marxist regimes since the Bolsheviks came to power, and we should pay attention while they are still merely amusing.

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Charlie Daniels Reschedules 2020 Volunteer Jam

Bethany Bowman

Due to coronavirus concerns, Country Music Hall of Famer Charlie Daniels announced Friday that he is rescheduling his 2020 Volunteer Jam. The concert, originally set for September 15 at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena, will now take place Monday, February 22, 2021, at 7:00 p.m. Central Time.

“Volunteer Jam is alive and well and is moving from September 2020 to February 22, 2021,” said Daniels. “The Jam turns 46 years old this year and this could be the best one yet.”

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Memphis Police Department to Stop Using No-Knock Warrants

The Associated Press

The Memphis Police Department has decided to stop using “no-knock” warrants in the wake of the fatal shooting of a black Kentucky woman by narcotics detectives who burst into her home.

Memphis police spokeswoman Karen Rudolph said the move to eliminate no-knock warrants had been a source of discussion since the death of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor, who was killed in March after police detectives smashed through her front door while serving a drug warrant in Louisville.

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More Than 75 Percent of Americans Approve of Police in Their Community: Poll

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There is a disparity between how Americans view policing countrywide and how they view policing in their own communities, a national poll found.

Seventy-seven percent of respondents said they approved of how their local police did their job, according to the Quinnipiac poll released Wednesday. Debate over police reform has been heating up in the wake of the death of George Floyd, who died in Minneapolis police custody May 25 after an officer knelt on his neck, video showed. Floyd’s death has been the catalyst for protests and riots across the country.

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Apple Closes Stores in Four States, Again, as Infections Rise

The Associated Press

Apple is closing 11 stores in Arizona, Florida, North Carolina and South Carolina that it had reopened just few weeks ago as coronavirus infections rates in some regions in the U.S. begin to rise.

The decision announced Friday is another sign that the pandemic might prevent the economy from bouncing back as quickly as some states have been hoping. Those concerns sent stocks on Wall Street lower Friday.

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Leahy and Carmichael Discuss Juneteenth and Chief Justice Roberts’s Decision on DACA

Julie Carr

Live from Music Row Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. –  host Leahy welcomed in-studio all-star panelist Crom Carmichael.

During the second hour, Leahy and Carmichael discuss Juneteenth and how Trump has done more for the black and Hispanic communities than previous presidents. The men also touched on the recent position that Chief Justice John Roberts took on an executive order that was signed eight years ago by former President Obama called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.

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Klobuchar Withdraws from VP Consideration, Urges Biden to Pick a Black Woman

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Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) has withdrawn herself from the running to be Joe Biden’s vice presidential running mate in November, according to CNN.

In her announcement on Lawrence O’Donnell’s show on MSNBC, she described the race riots following the death of George Floyd as “a historic moment,” and that America “must seize on this moment.” She then urged the former vice president and presumptive Democratic nominee “to put a woman of color on the ticket.”

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Nashville Boutique Venues Owner Dan Cook Talks About the Unequal Application of the Law and Hope for Phase Three

Julie Carr

Live from Music Row Friday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. –  host Leahy welcomed the owner of Nashville Boutique Venues Dan Cook to the newsmakers line.

During the third hour, Cook explained how his business comes into play with the mayor allowing Phase Three to open next Monday. He described the phase openings as an unequal application of the law by way of the equations of “capacity” being used by the Metro government.

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Ohio GOP Central Committee Censures Former Chairman Matt Borges for Supporting Biden

Jason M. Reynolds

Matt Borges has been censured by the Ohio Republican Central Committee for working to defeat President Donald Trump and ensure Joe Biden wins the election.

Borges is the former chairman of the Ohio Republican Party. However, he has been running the Right Side PAC to support Biden, The Plain Dealer reported. The party said they took the action as well due to an FEC violation and Borges’ continued criticism of Trump. They also stripped his “chairman emeritus” status. 

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