Tag: Department of State

Report: Record 10 Million Immigration Cases Completed in Fiscal 2023

The Center Square
Illegal border crosser in handcuffs

The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) completed an unprecedented 10 million immigration cases in fiscal 2023, reducing its backlog for the first time in over a decade, according to a newly released end of fiscal year 2023 report.

“We’ve completed a record number of cases, responded to emerging crises around the globe with essential humanitarian relief, and applied innovative solutions to improve customer experience and reduce backlogs,” USCIS Director Ur M. Jaddou said of the milestone.

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Rep. Mark Green Re-Introduces Bill to Kick Communist China Out of Hollywood

Laura Baigert

U.S. Representative Mark Green (R-TN-07) on Wednesday re-introduced the Stopping Communist Regimes from Engaging in Edits Now or SCREEN Act to discourage Hollywood from bowing to censorship from Beijing.

Green originally introduced the SCREEN Act just over a year ago on February 28, 2022, during the second session of the 117th Congress as H.R. 6855. Around the same time, the combat veteran of Afghanistan and Iraq issued a scathing op-ed calling on the Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin to put an end to Hollywood using the U.S. military for censorship by the Chinese.

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Tennessee Congressman Green, Fellow Committee Members Push for Answers on Mexico Aid

Bradley Vasoli

U.S. Representative Mark Green (R-TN-7) is joining other GOP members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee in requesting Secretary of State Antony Blinken provide an accounting of the amount, goals and uses of American aid to Mexico during the Biden administration so far.

Last Thursday, committee Ranking Member Michael McCaul (R-TX-10) authored a letter with Green and other Republicans on the panel expressing particular concern to the secretary about the extent to which U.S. taxpayer money has been used to facilitate illegal immigration. Committee members are concerned about the administration having abandoned the previous White House’s policy requiring many asylum seekers at the southern border to remain in Mexico. The Republicans want to know how much the government is spending to bring these migrants into America. 

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Biden Admin Spend Up to $300K in Taxpayer Money to Boost LGBT ‘Social Acceptance’ in Botswana

Admin

The Biden administration is spending up to $300,000 in tax dollars to promote gay and transgender “social acceptance” in Botswana, according to a federal grant listing reviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The Department of State will award one U.S. organization or academic institution with the funds so they may “bolster LGBTQI+ community initiatives” and “build support networks and organizations” in the African country. The participants, which will travel to the country and spend up to 18 months there, will be tasked with promoting gay and transgender acceptance among “influential religious groups and traditional groups.”

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Bill to Mandate Human Trafficking Awareness Training in Lodging Introduced in Pennsylvania

Bradley Vasoli

State Sen. Judy Schwank (D-PA-Reading) announced on Monday she will introduce a bill mandating that Pennsylvania hotel and motel businesses train their workers in human-trafficking awareness. 

Human trafficking, an industry the International Labour Office believes to generate $150 billion each year, is a form of slavery whereby human beings are defrauded or coerced into servitude that is often sexual in nature. The U.S. Department of State estimates that about 25 million people worldwide are victims of human trafficking. Of those, nearly a third are children or teenagers and roughly half are women. 

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Andy Biggs Introduces Legislation to Prevent the Biden Administration from Using Federal Funds to Impose Woke Ideology Abroad

Neil Jones

Arizona Representative Andy Biggs introduced legislation Tuesday called the Stop Imposing Woke Ideology Abroad Act, which seeks to prohibit federal funding for the State Department’s Equity Action Plan (EAP).

“Using taxpayer dollars to fund the Biden Administration’s woke programs abroad is a complete misuse of federal funding and further strains our relationships with countries abroad,” Biggs said in a press release. “This legislation ensures we protect American interests and curb the Biden Administration’s detached social agenda abroad.”

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Evacuation Flight Departs Afghanistan for the First Time Since November

Admin

On Wednesday, after a nearly two-month pause, another evacuation flight departed the country of Afghanistan en route for the United States.

According to CNN, the flight was a Qatar Airways flight that departed from Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, paid for by the United States government, with an unknown number of American citizens on board. It is the first such flight since November.

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Bill to Streamline Campaign Finance Reporting Gets Pennsylvania Senate Approval

The Center Square

Legislation authored by Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Pat Browne, R-Lehigh, to bring transparency and efficiency to Pennsylvania’s campaign finance reporting system was approved by the state Senate.

Under Senate Bill 140, all candidates for office and political action committees will be required to file with the secretary of the commonwealth by utilizing the Pennsylvania Department of State’s online filing system to provide campaign finance reports.

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Pentagon Says Almost 450 Americans Are Still in Afghanistan

Admin

Nearly 450 American citizens are estimated to remain in Afghanistan almost two months after U.S. troops withdrew from the country, according to the Pentagon.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken originally said the Biden administration believed there to be “under 200, and likely closer to 100, who remain in Afghanistan and want to leave,” on Aug. 30, the day before the last Anerican troops left Afghanistan.

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State Department Launching Investigations into Afghanistan Withdrawal

Admin

The State Department’s inspector general will investigate the Biden administration’s diplomatic operations in Afghanistan, a spokesperson confirmed with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The series of investigations will tackle a range of issues, from the State Department’s Special Immigrant Visa (SIV) program, to the processing of Afghans who applied for refugee admission into the U.S, to the resettlement of those refugees and visa recipients, according to an Oct. 15 action memorandum to Secretary of State Antony Blinken first obtained by Politico.

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Pennsylvania Governor Recalls Secretary Nomination Amid Legislative Election Probe

Admin

Gov. Tom Wolf recalled his nomination for acting Secretary of State Veronica Degraffenreid on Monday after alleging that Senate Republicans would not vet her fairly amid the chamber’s controversial election investigation.

“It is clear that instead of providing advice and consent on my nominee for Secretary of the Commonwealth, they instead plan on using her confirmation as an opportunity to descend further into conspiracy theories and work to please the former president [Donald Trump] by spreading lies about last year’s election, instead of working together to address real issues facing Pennsylvanians,” Wolf said in an emailed statement to reporters on Monday.

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State Department Can’t Answer How U.S. Will Deal with Afghan Refugees Who Do Not Pass ‘Rigorous’ Security Screening

Admin

The State Department would not reveal what the U.S. will do with Afghan refugees who are flagged for security reasons.

“I would rather not entertain a hypothetical,” Ned Price, a spokesperson for the State Department, said at a press briefing Thursday when asked what would happen to Afghan evacuees who fail the vetting process.

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State Department Says It Doesn’t Have Data on Number of Americans Rescued Since Last Kabul Flight

Admin

A spokesperson for the State Department said he did not “have data” on whether Americans have been rescued from Afghanistan since the last U.S. flight out of Kabul at a press briefing on Wednesday.

“I don’t have data to provide on that front,” State Department spokesperson Ned Price said at the briefing when asked if he had a number.

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Report: U.S. Left Behind Majority of Afghan Allies Who Applied for Visas

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The U.S. abandoned more than half of all interpreters and Afghans who applied for special immigrant visas (SIV), a senior State Department official told The Wall Street Journal.

The official didn’t share specific information or figures, but estimated that a majority of the visa applicants were left behind in Afghanistan, the WSJ reported. The Department of State doesn’t have exact data on who was evacuated from the Middle Eastern nation after the Taliban took control of the capital city of Kabul, due to the urgent nature of the operation.

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Pennsylvania GOP Senators’ Internal Battle Over Imperiled Forensic Election Audit Goes Public

Admin

An internal fight among legislators over a forensic election audit is spilling into public after Sen. Doug Mastriano, R-Gettysburg, accused leaders in his own party of stonewalling his investigation.

The senator made the comments during a Thursday interview with One America News Network that he later doubled down on in a lengthy statement posted to his social media pages the following day.

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Rep. Tim Burchett Introduces Bill to Eliminate Backlog of Passport Applications

Cooper Moran

U.S. Representative Tim Burchett (R-TN-02) joined a group of bipartisan lawmakers to introduce legislation to help eliminate the current processing backlog of U.S. passport applications.

As economies around the world slowly begin to reopen, the State Department has witnessed a dramatic surge in passport applications and renewals, which has led to a jam of close to 2.2 million applications and has greatly extended the time to receive the document required for international travel.

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Committee on Foreign Investment May Not Be Able to Handle Its Exploding Caseload

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by Riley Walters   The Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. is often compared to a black box. Investors may be aware of what it does, but few know what really goes on inside. The nine members of the committee, drawn from various federal agencies, are in charge of reviewing foreign investments to determine whether or not they may pose a threat to U.S. national security. Glimpses of the committee’s activities are largely limited to what’s reported in its annual publications and the occasional breaking news story – such as the recent report that the committee wants Beijing Kunlun Tech Co. Ltd. to sell its dating application, Grindr. It can be difficult to keep up with the committee given limitations on the information that is shared publicly – especially given its obligation to protect investors’ proprietary information as well as information sensitive to U.S. national security. Still, the limited information that becomes available can help inform investors of potential hurdles and costs they may face when seeking the committee’s blessings. [ The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more ] Over the last few years, the number of…

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James O’Keefe’s Undercover ‘Deep State’ #Resistance Video Reveals the Only Way to Drain the Swamp is to Fire the Swamp

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by Rick Manning   Project Veritas’ latest video exposé reveals that the #Resistance movement runs deeply within the federal government. However, due to the civil service laws, those who refuse to do their jobs are nearly impossible to root out and fire. The only way to fix this broken federal civil service system is for Congress to pass the MERIT Act. Federal civilian workers know that they cannot be fired even under the most egregious circumstances, and under current civil service law they are correct. The sad truth is that it takes between six months and a year to fire the 0.53 percent of federal workers who are terminated with cause. When you include layoffs and terminations for cause, the Office of Personnel Management reports that the percentage of federal career civil servants asked to leave against their will swells to 2.68 percent in 2017. Unfortunately, the federal government does not track the private sector termination rate for cause, but the Bureau of Labor Statistics does show that a federal civil servant is 6.4 times less likely to be fired or laid off than those in the private sector who pay their salaries. What few people realize is that President Obama signed an Presidential…

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