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SCOTUS’ Timidity Triggers Constitutional Crisis


By: Margot Cleveland | April 14, 2025

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2025/04/14/scotus-timidity-triggers-constitutional-crisis/

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The Supreme Court’s continuing failure to define lower courts’ authority is wreaking havoc on the reputation of the courts — and our constitutional order.

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The Supreme Court has interceded six times in less than three months to rein in federal judges who improperly exceeded their Article III authority and infringed on the Article II authority of President Donald Trump. Yet the high court continues to issue mealy-mouthed opinions which serve only to exacerbate the ongoing battle between the Executive and Judicial branches of government. And now there is a constitutional crisis primed to explode this week in a federal court in Maryland over the removal of an El Salvadoran — courtesy of the justices’ latest baby-splitting foray on Thursday.

On Thursday last, in Noem v. Garcia, the Supreme Court issued a short two-page order on President Trump’s application asking the justices to vacate an injunction issued by Maryland federal judge Paula Xinis. That injunction, issued on April 4, 2025, ordered the Trump Administration “to facilitate and effectuate the return of Plaintiff Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to the United States by no later than 11:59 PM on Monday, April 7, 2025.” The lower court further held that the “preliminary relief is issued to restore the status quo and to preserve Abrego Garcia’s access to due process in accordance with the Constitution and governing immigration statutes.”

After the Fourth Circuit refused to stay Judge Xinis’ order, the Trump Administration filed an application with the Supreme Court seeking an immediate stay followed by vacatur of the injunction. In its application, the Trump Administration acknowledged that Garcia had been wrongly removed to El Salvador, agreeing that there was an order barring Garcia’s return to his native homeland. However, the Trump Administration stressed that the order also concluded Garcia, as an alien illegally present in the United States, was subject to removal under federal law — just not to El Salvador. The immigration judge also rejected Garcia’s petition for asylum and for withholding of removal under CAT, or the Convention Against Torture. The Board of Immigration Appeals upheld those decisions.

Further, while Garcia had been wrongly removed to El Salvador, the Trump Administration argued that Judge Xinis lacked the authority to order him to “facilitate and effectuate” Garcia’s return. First, it was not for a federal judge to tell the Executive branch how to engage in diplomatic relations. And second, the president lacks the ability to control a foreign sovereign, making it impossible for him to “effectuate” Garcia’s return to the United States. Finally, Judge Xinis’ order improperly directs the Trump Administration to admit Garcia even though he is a member of MS-13, which has been designated a terrorist organization.

Chief Judge John Roberts granted the Trump Administration an administrative stay, thereby nixing the April 7, 2025 deadline for the president to have “effectuated” Garcia’s return to the United States. Then on April 10, 2025, the Supreme Court entered an order stating the Trump Administration’s “application is granted in part and denied in part, subject to the direction of this order.”

But what precisely were those directions? Well, first, there was the deadline, which had already come and gone, and so the Court stated: “[T]he deadline imposed by the District Court has now passed.  To that extent, the Government’s emergency application is effectively granted in part and the deadline in the challenged order is no longer effective.”

The Supreme Court then said that “[t]he rest of the District Court’s order remains in effect but requires clarification on remand.” Here, the high court explained what parts of the lower court order it believed proper, namely to “require the Government to ‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.” However, “[t]he intended scope of the term ‘effectuate,” the Supreme Court explained, is “unclear, and may exceed the District Court’s authority.” The Supreme Court ended by stating “[t]he District Court should clarify its directive, with due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs.” But “the Government should be prepared to share what it can concerning the steps it has taken and the prospect of further steps,” the Supreme Court added.

What exactly does any of that mean?

To Judge Xinis it meant she merely needed to clarify what “effectuate” means. But rather than do that, the Barack Obama appointee just dropped that directive from her injunction, amending her order “to DIRECT that Defendants take all available steps to facilitate the return of Abrego Garcia to the United States as soon as possible.” 

She further directed the Trump Administration to file “a supplemental declaration from an individual with personal knowledge, addressing the following: (1) the current physical location and custodial status of Abrego Garcia; (2) what steps, if any, Defendants have taken to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s immediate return to the United States; and (3) what additional steps Defendants will take, and when, to facilitate his return.” 

Late Thursday, Judge Xinis ordered the Trump administration to file that declaration by 9:30 a.m. on Friday, even though the Supreme Court’s order only dropped Thursday evening around 7:00 p.m. The Maryland-based federal judge then denied the government’s motion for extension of time until Tuesday to file the declaration, but she gave them an additional two hours.

Unsurprisingly, 11:30 a.m. came and went without the declaration being filed. Soon after, the Trump Administration filed a response to the court’s amended injunction, noting it was “unable to provide the information requested by the Court on the impracticable deadline set by the Court hours after the Supreme Court issued its order.” The government’s response continued:

“Defendants are not in a position where they ‘can’ share any information requested by the Court. That is the reality. Defendants received the order late in the evening last night. They are reviewing the order and actively evaluating next steps. It is unreasonable and impracticable for Defendants to reveal potential steps before those steps are reviewed, agreed upon, and vetted. Foreign affairs cannot operate on judicial timelines, in part because it involves sensitive country-specific considerations wholly inappropriate for judicial review.”

Rather than re-evaluate her position, Judge Xinis doubled down, finding “Defendants have failed to comply with this Court’s Order,” and stating, “Defendants made no meaningful effort to comply.” She then entered a further order requiring the Trump Administration to file daily, on or before 5:00 p.m., “a declaration made by an individual with personal knowledge as to any information regarding: (1) the current physical location and custodial status of Abrego Garcia; (2) what steps, if any, Defendants have taken to facilitate his immediate return to the United States; (3) what additional steps Defendants will take, and when, to facilitate his return.” 

Judge Xinis added that if plaintiffs wanted any additional relief, they should file a motion by Saturday at 5:00 p.m. Garcia’s attorneys filed the suggested Motion on Saturday, asking the court to grant “three additional types of relief.” 

First, the El Salvadoran’s lawyers asked the Court to order the government to, by end of day on Monday: (a) request “its agents and contractors release Abrego Garcia from custody in El Salvador pursuant to the contract or arrangement providing for his detention there at the Government’s direction; (b) dispatch personnel to accompany Abrego Garcia upon his release from [the El Salvadoran prison] to ensure his safe passage to the aircraft that will return him to the United States; (c) [p]rovide air transportation for Abrego Garcia to return to Maryland, because he may not be in current possession of sufficient identification to board a commercial flight; and (d) “[g]rant Abrego Garcia parole” and “prepare all paperwork and forms required to allow him to reenter the United States.”

Second, Garcia’s attorneys asked for the Court to grant their client discovery including production of the Trump Administration’s contract with El Salvador concerning detentions at the prison. The illegal alien’s attorneys further requested the court direct the Trump Administration to produce witnesses for the hearing scheduled for Tuesday. Specifically, Garcia’s attorneys wanted to question representatives from the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, and the Department of State, concerning:  “(i) Abrego Garcia’s current physical location and custodial status; (ii) what steps, if any, the Government has taken to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return to the United States; (iii) whether the Government has informed officials at CECOT that it wishes Abrego Garcia to be released into U.S. custody;  and (iv) what, if any, additional steps the Government intends to take, and when, to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return.”

Finally, the plaintiff’s attorneys requested the court order the government to show cause why they should not be held in contempt for violating the Court’s command that they file a declaration by Friday at 11:30 a.m.

Shortly after Garcia’s motion hit the docket, the Trump Administration filed its first required daily declaration. That declaration attested that, based on official reporting from our Embassy in San Salvador, “Abrego Garcia is currently being held in the Terrorism Confinement Center in El Salvador.” “He is alive and secure in that facility,” the declaration continued, adding: “He is detained pursuant to the sovereign, domestic authority of El Salvador.” The second daily declaration, filed yesterday, stated the government’s declarant had nothing to add to those facts.

Judge Xinis has not yet ruled on the plaintiff’s motion, but given her refusal to respond reasonably to the Trump Administration’s request for an extension of time to file the declaration, her utter failure to show any deference to the Trump Administration’s handling of foreign affairs, and that the declarations said nothing of efforts by the Trump Administration to obtain Garcia’s release from prison, it seems likely she will grant Garcia much of what he requests. 

Yet, those requests, as the Trump Administration pointed out yesterday in its response brief, directly infringe on the president’s Article II authority. “The federal courts have no authority to direct the Executive Branch to conduct foreign relations in a particular way or engage with a foreign sovereign in a given manner,” the Trump Administration wrote. Rather, “[t]hat is the ‘exclusive power of the President as the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations.’”  

While the Supreme Court has declared that “[s]uch power is ‘conclusive and preclusive,’ and beyond the reach of the federal courts’ equitable authority,” given her orders to date, Judge Xinis is unlikely to stand down. Rather, expect the Obama appointee to enter another scathing order demanding details and actions. But with its core executive powers at stake, the Trump Administration cannot comply.

The justices should have foreseen this standoff and defused the situation last week by clearly defining the limits of the lower court’s authority. The Supreme Court’s continuing failure to do so is wreaking havoc on the reputation of the courts — and our constitutional order.

Margot Cleveland is an investigative journalist and legal analyst and serves as The Federalist’s senior legal correspondent. Margot’s work has been published at The Wall Street Journal, The American Spectator, the New Criterion, National Review Online, Townhall.com, the Daily Signal, USA Today, and the Detroit Free Press. She is also a regular guest on nationally syndicated radio programs and on Fox News, Fox Business, and Newsmax. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize—the law school’s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. Cleveland is also of counsel for the New Civil Liberties Alliance. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland where you can read more about her greatest accomplishments—her dear husband and dear son. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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Leftists Want Direct Democracy Because It’s Easy to Manipulate the Masses


BY: CASEY CHALK | JANUARY 03, 2024

Read more at https://thefederalist.com/2024/01/03/leftists-want-direct-democracy-because-its-easy-to-manipulate-the-masses/

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“American democracy is cracking,” warns Washington Post Chief Correspondent Dan Balz in a recent column that presents some ideas to repair it. His suggestions include, among other things, proportional representation, diminishing the power of the Senate, and eliminating the Electoral College. What these three suggestions have in common is a desire to remove any intermediary institutions between the will of the people and government action — otherwise known as “direct” democracy. 

These proposals are not new. Indeed, even the framers of the Constitution were familiar with them. But the reasons why such suggestions would significantly erode the republican government envisioned by our Founding Fathers are not new either. 

Given Biden’s low approval ratings — especially in important swing states with critical Electoral College votes — as well as broader Democrat fears of a Republican takeover of the Senate, we will likely hear a renewed chorus of voices calling for direct democracy. After all, masses of individuals are much easier to manipulate than smaller families, communities, or even states. Conservatives would do well to arm themselves with the best arguments against such initiatives.

Founders Worked to Curb Direct Democracy

The framers of our Constitution felt quite strongly that direct democracy was something to avoid. In Federalist 10, for example, the Father of the Constitution James Madison warned of “the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority” on a government, or what has come to be called the “tyranny of the majority,” in which a majority of the population exerts great coercive power over minority factions.

Again in Federalist 51, Madison wrote: “[I]n the federal republic of the United States … all authority in it will be derived from and dependent on the society, the society itself will be broken into so many parts, interests, and classes of citizens, that the rights of individuals, or of the minority, will be in little danger from interested combinations of the majority.” 

Our second president, John Adams, called a unicameral legislative body — in which each member is accountable to his constituents — a “tyranny of the majority.” Adams, reflecting the opinion of that founding generation, argued for “a mixed government, consisting of three branches.” The framers took various steps to disburse power among the federal government, dividing it into three competing branches: executive, legislative, and judicial. 

But the founders’ dispersion of governing power also goes beyond the three branches. The 10th Amendment reads: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” In other words, unless the Constitution expressly grants certain powers to the federal government, those powers exist in the states or, even more decentralized, in local communities of Americans. 

Later Generations Understood the Threat

A generation after that founding generation, visiting French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville authored an extended survey of American politics and culture, Democracy in America. Tocqueville perceived that the American political system was created to resist the tyranny of the majority, “which bases its claim to rule upon numbers, not upon rightness or excellence.” Thus, Tocqueville writes:

When a man or a party suffers from an injustice in the United States, to whom do you want them to appeal? To public opinion? That is what forms the majority. To the legislative body? It represents the majority and blindly obeys it. To the executive power? It is named by the majority and serves it as a passive instrument. 

In other words, the executive branch, even with its disbursed powers, can be influenced by this tyrannical tendency to reflect the opinions of the majority of the people against minority interests at the state or community level. It was thus only through the states and local bases of power and voluntary associations that this tyrannical tendency could be avoided. 

A century after Tocqueville’s warnings, Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis discussed another way to understand our nation’s default desire to resist direct democracy. Brandeis was one of the first to describe the states as “laboratories of democracy.” In his New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann opinion, he explained how “a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country.”  

State and local autonomy served as a means of testing laws and policies to evaluate their effectiveness before implementing across a diverse nation of states, localities, and subcultures. If something works at the micro level, other localities or states — and even potentially the federal government — can appreciate and adopt it. 

Constant Temptation of Direct Democracy

Yet such a deliberative process of testing is slow and uneven. And we Americans are often eager for speedy solutions. Political theorists, journalists, and ordinary citizens throughout American history have been frustrated by the Constitution’s manifold methods of distributing power to deter the tyranny of the majority. If a majority of the nation’s populace wants something, they posit, why shouldn’t they be able to get it? After all, as the journalist H.L. Mencken wryly commented, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” 

Such demands especially increase at times of heightened political gridlock in which the country obviously has a particular problem or set of problems but constitutionally mandated laws and procedures thwart attempts to resolve them. When we are all vexed with our politicians for failing to act in what we believe to be the interests of the nation (and its voters), it’s easy to be sympathetic to that line of thinking. 

Yet we must beware of this temptation, which reflects what conservative political theorist Russell Kirk calls a manifestation of vox populi, vox dei — the voice of the people is the voice of God. In other words, as long as they constitute a majority, whatever the people want becomes the law of the land. 

Direct democracy thus not only represents a threat to freedom, but it is a political order that rejects hierarchies both natural and spiritual. Although these hierarchies are sometimes abused, they serve as a cautionary brake upon the whims of the masses, which — as many revolutions have demonstrated — can be quite violent and destructive. Just look at the French or Russian Revolutions, which ended up terrorizing those they claimed to represent. Millions of dead across the world reveal the problem with direct democracy.

This is the reason for state representation rather than proportional representation in the lower House, a Senate consisting of equal representation by state, the filibuster, the Electoral College, and powers relegated to the states vis-a-vis the 10th Amendment. All of it is an attempt to slow the destructive force of vox populi, vox dei. 

As that great French observer of American politics Alexis de Tocqueville observed: “If ever freedom is lost in America, that will be due to the … majority driving minorities to desperation…” 

Let’s do everything we can to avoid that scenario.

Casey Chalk is a senior contributor at The Federalist and an editor and columnist at The New Oxford Review. He has a bachelor’s in history and master’s in teaching from the University of Virginia and a master’s in theology from Christendom College. He is the author of The Persecuted: True Stories of Courageous Christians Living Their Faith in Muslim Lands.

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Build the wall, pass Kate’s Law, and tell Democrats to go to hell


Posted December 01, 2017 11:04 AM by Chris Pandolfo

 

URL of the original posting site: https://www.conservativereview.com/articles/build-the-wall-pass-kates-law-and-tell-democrats-to-go-to-hell?

Kate Steinle Senate Judiciary Committee hearing | Mark Wilson | Getty Images

President Donald Trump is outraged at the outcome of the Kate Steinle murder trial, in which accused killer Jose Ines Garcia Zarate was found not guilty by a California jury on Thursday. His outrage is justified.

On July 1, 2015, the 32-year-old Steinle was shot in the back on Pier 14 in San Francisco while she was walking with her father. No one denies that Zarate shot her, but he claimed that he found a handgun wrapped in a T-shirt under a bench on the pier and that it fired accidentally as he tried to extract it.

Zarate was found not guilty of murder and not guilty of the lesser charges of involuntary manslaughter and assault with a deadly weapon. He was convicted of illegally possessing a firearm, a sentence that carries up to three years. Federal immigration officials have stated that Zarate will be deported for a sixth time after he serves jail time.

Before the shooting, Zarate, an illegal immigrant who was deported five times previously, had been released from jail where he was being held on drug charges. He was released because of San Francisco’s sanctuary city polices, contrary to the will of federal immigration authorities who wanted him detained. He then went on to kill Steinle. 

President Trump called the verdict in Zarate’s trial a “disgrace.” He accused the previous administration of failing to protect the U.S. border and the Democratic party of being weak on crime. He also repeated his call to build a wall on the southern border.

President Trump’s tweets reflect the anger felt among his voters at the injustice of Kate Steinle’s death.

The issue is not that illegal immigrants commit a disproportionate number of crimes compared to American citizens. It is that every crime committed by an illegal immigrant is preventable if the United States would enforce its immigration laws and secure the border.

On the campaign trail in 2016, Trump consistently brought up Kate Steinle’s murder during while giving his pitch to voters on why the U.S. needs stricter immigration laws, tougher border enforcement, and an end to sanctuary city policies. Trump strongly supported the passage of Kate’s Law, which would increase penalties for those who attempt to re-enter the country after deportation, as Zarate did.

Every American with common sense understands that cities do not have the right to lawlessly nullify immigration law and endanger Americans. And someone who enters the United States illegally and commits crimes should be deported and never allowed back.

But that is not the case on the ground today, and so far Congress has been unwilling to act. Kate’s Law remains stalled in the U.S Senate. Funding for border security is hotly contested, as Congress debates extending current government spending levels through Dec. 22 to avoid government shutdown. Meanwhile, some Republicans are instead working to include a deal for DACA amnesty in the spending bill to be passed before the end of this year.

The American people cry out for justice. They want to be protected. They want American borders to be respected. They want illegal immigrant criminals expelled from this country. And instead, Congress is looking for ways to jam an amnesty package into a last-minute spending bill after sitting on its hands all year long and breaking other promises to repeal Obamacare and cut taxes.

President Trump is right that Democrats will pay a big price in the 2018 elections if they continue to obstruct the enforcement of American immigration law, but he doesn’t go far enough. If Republicans fail to deliver on tougher immigration enforcement, if they pass amnesty first instead, they will pay a far greater price for betraying their promises and wasting their time in power.

There are several actions the government can take to address the injustice of this pathetic verdict and ensure that there will be no more deaths like Kate Steinle’s. First, Attorney General Jeff Sessions should indict Zarate as an illegal immigrant in possession of a firearm. This is the action Trump’s executive branch can immediately take.

Next, Congress should unilaterally defund sanctuary cities and tie Kate’s Law to next week’s spending resolution. If the Democrats object to enforcing federal immigration law, if they threaten a government shutdown to stop an effort to prevent another American death at the hands of a deported illegal immigrant, let them.

Let them attempt to defend their indefensible destruction of America.

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Donald Trump has HAD IT with Mitch McConnell’s bucket of suck


Posted August 10, 2017 03:39 PM by Chris Pandolfo

 

President Donald Trump meets Mitch McConnell after his first speech to Congress

 

 

Is the time of Senator Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., as majority leader in the U.S. Senate coming to an end? If not an end, certainly a turning point.

The American people believe, rightly, that the Congress under the leadership of McConnell and Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., hasn’t done much. Nearly seven in 10 Americans (68 percent) judge the Republican-controlled Congress a failure, according to a new CNN poll. The approval rating of Republican leadership has fallen to a dismal 24 percent.

And why shouldn’t Americans think Congress has failed? The Republicans broke their number one campaign promise from the past seven years in their unwillingness to repeal Obamacare. In more than six months of unified Republican government, the GOP has yet to deliver on the core pieces of President Trump’s legislative agenda.

President Trump has noticed. As McConnell chastised the president for having unrealistic expectations of what the Senate could accomplish, Trump took to Twitter to remind Senator McConnell that he only expects Republicans to keep promises they’ve made for years.

And it wasn’t just on Twitter:

Can McConnell do it? Even as the president criticizes Sen. McConnell’s lame excuses, other Republicans are beginning to show signs of irritation with the majority leader.

“I like Mitch, but for eight years, we’ve been saying we’re going to repeal and replace Obamacare. It’s not like we made this up overnight. We have been working on repealing Obamacare all year,” Senator Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. told Fox News Radio’s “The Brian Kilmeade Show” Wednesday.

“There is no way to sugarcoat this. The Republican Party promised for eight years to repeal and replace Obamacare, we failed, and if we give up, shame on us,” Graham said.

Dissatisfaction with the process leading up to the GOP’s failed attempt at the fake repeal of Obamacare brought together Sens. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, Lindsey Graham, Mike Lee, R-Utah, Ron Johnson, R-Wisc., and John McCain, R-Ariz. in criticism of McConnell’s leadership.

Candidates for the U.S. Senate Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Ala., and former Judge Roy Moore have both taken shots at McConnell, with Moore blasting “Mitch McConnell’s D.C. slime machine” and Brooks calling for McConnell to step down from leadership.

McConnell’s failures are demonstrable, and his plan for future legislative success is unclear. This fall, Republicans in Congress will face several challenges as the debt limit, funding for the government, and tax reform dominate the business of the Senate.

What is McConnell’s plan?

So far, it seems Republicans will pass a clean debt limit increase without extracting a single policy concession from the Left. And as long as McConnell adamantly refuses to consider a government shutdown, Democrats hold all the negotiating power over the budget. President Trump and the Republicans capitulated once already on government funding back in April — what is McConnell’s plan to secure funding for Trump’s priorities in the face of Democratic obstruction? And where does tax reform fit between what will be long, protracted fights on government spending and the debt limit as conservative opposition to growing government mounts?

If McConnell doesn’t come up with answers to these questions fast, he may find President Trump calling for him to step down. As the president himself said Friday when asked if he thinks McConnell should go:

“Well, I’ll tell you what, if he doesn’t get repeal and replace done, if he doesn’t get taxes done, meaning cuts and reform, and if he doesn’t get a very easy one to get done, infrastructure, if he doesn’t get them done, then you can ask me that question.”

Chris Pandolfo is a staff writer and type-shouter for Conservative Review. He holds a B.A. in politics and economics from Hillsdale College. His interests are conservative political philosophy, the American founding, and progressive rock. Follow him on Twitter for doom-saying and great album recommendations @ChrisCPandolfo.

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House GOP demands new special counsel to investigate Obama admin


Posted July 28, 2017 01:35 PM by Chris Pandolfo

URL of the original posting site: https://www.conservativereview.com/articles/house-gop-demands-new-special-counsel-to-investigate-obama-admin

Clinton & Obama | Marc Nozell | Flickr

House Republicans want a new special counsel to investigate members of the Obama administration.

The House Judiciary Committee on Thursday sent a letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein calling for the appointment of a second special counsel to investigate former Attorney General Loretta Lynch, former FBI Director James Comey, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Heavy reports.

“We are writing to you to request assistance in restoring public confidence in our nation’s justice system and its investigators, specifically the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI),” the letter says. “We need to enable these agencies to perform their necessary and important law enforcement and intelligence functions fully unhindered by politics.”

Republicans expressed that they are not confident that Special Counsel Robert Mueller is investigating the full scope of matters related to the 2016 election, especially those pertaining to interference in the election conducted by members of the Obama administration.

“The unbalanced, uncertain, and seemingly unlimited focus of the special counsel’s investigation has led many of our constituents to see a dual standard of justice that benefits only the powerful and politically well-connected,” the letter states.

Among the evidence of untoward behavior by the Obama administration Republicans cited was Mr. Comey’s sworn testimony before Congress that Loretta Lynch instructed him to refer to the FBI’s criminal probe into Hillary Clinton as a “matter” rather than an “investigation.” Additional reports of Comey’s closed-door testimony before Congress go further than the public record, suggesting that Lynch told Comey to get out of her office after he confronted her privately with evidence that suggested she had agreed “to put the kibosh on any prosecution of Clinton.”

Comey’s own decision to close the investigation into Secretary Clinton shortly after that meeting has also caused suspicion of misconduct.

Conservative Review Editor-in-Chief Mark Levin has previously called for former FBI Director Comey to be investigated. Earlier this month, The Hill reported that over half of Comey’s private memos on conversations he had with President Trump contained classified information. If that report is true, Comey had the same disregard for classified information as Hillary Clinton, whom he was criminally investigating for before declaring that he would not indict Clinton.

“It’s absolutely contemptible,” Levin said of Comey’s behavior, declaring that Comey “must be subjected to an investigation.”

Further, Levin has noted how there is ample evidence of how the Obama administration colluded to cover up its knowledge of Russian interference in the 2016 election.

This letter by House Republicans is just the first step in what must be a comprehensive investigation of the Obama administration’s actions during the 2016 election.

Here is the letter in full:

House Judiciary Letter by Chris on Scribd

https://www.scribd.com/embeds/354905846/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&access_key=key-YsJ3EedNhoXiqaAcY6IN&show_recommendations=true

Chris Pandolfo is a staff writer and type-shouter for Conservative Review. He holds a B.A. in politics and economics from Hillsdale College. His interests are conservative political philosophy, the American founding, and progressive rock. Follow him on Twitter for doom-saying and great album recommendations @ChrisCPandolfo.

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Voters are backing POTUS’ travel moratorium, big league


Posted July 05, 2017 10:50 AM by Nate Madden

URL of the original posting site: https://www.conservativereview.com/articles/voters-are-backing-potus-travel-moratorium-big-league

president thumbs up outside on south lawn of white house

President Donald Trump gives a ‘thumbs up’ as he walks across the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Wednesday, June 7, 2017. Pablo Martinez Monsivais | AP Images

After months of wrangling against the mainstream media and liberal federal judges, President Trump’s moratorium on immigration from six Middle Eastern countries has not only won at the Supreme Court, but is winning in the court of public opinion, according to a new Politico/Morning Consult poll.

Per the story at Politico Wednesday, when asked about the administration’s “new guidelines which say visa applicants from six predominantly Muslim countries must prove a close family relationship with a U.S. resident in order to ender the country,” 60 percent of those surveyed supported the measure, while a mere 28 percent were against it.

The survey of almost 2,000 registered voters also found that the policy was a big hit with independents in addition to Republicans. While 84 percent of GOP voters support the revised measure, 56 percent of independent voters got behind it as well, with just 30 percent opposed.

Finally, registered Democrats signaled more of a split on the policy than a decided opposition to it, showing only a five-point discrepancy with no majority either way. A mere 46 percent of Democrat voters opposed the moratorium, with 41 percent in favor.

The moratorium popularity boost comes at a moment when both the president and his primary policy focus – health care reform – are facing rough numbers themselves.

And with the GOP’s efforts to repeal/address/bail out Obamacare stuck in political limbo and tax reform far away on the horizon, it would appear that the kind of tough anti-terror and immigration policy that got him elected might just be the clearest winner in the president’s political arsenal.

When news of the unanimous Supreme Court decision holding up the substantive portions of the moratorium came out, Conservative Review’s Daniel Horowitz pointed out that the win provided the administration an opportunity to seize and expand upon. The new polling numbers this week appear to have proven him correct, on some level.

“With Obamacare repeal going down in flames and Republicans accomplishing nothing else, Trump needs to notch up some transformational victories on immigration,” Horowitz wrote. “Ensuring that America doesn’t self-immolate as a civilization, as Europe is doing before our very eyes, should be at the top of that list.”

He goes on to suggest that Trump should continue charging forward on his national security agenda by imposing a full-year moratorium on refugee resettlement until the full impact of the program can be evaluated, especially since the highest court in the land has issued the no-brainer ruling that he has the authority to do so.

“There is something seriously wrong when, even according to former FBI Director James Comey, 300 of the roughly 2,000 terrorism investigations relate to refugees, well beyond their composition of the population,” Horowitz concluded.

He goes on to argue that the current Obama-designated cap of 50,000 resettlements per year is too high and that lowering it would “send a clear message that security is paramount and that such a move is well within his authority.”

As of the time of this writing, the current number of refugee resettlements for this fiscal year is at 49,255.

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While Kim Davis was Illegally Put in Jail, Obama did This


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URL of the original posting site:
http://freedomoutpost.com/2015/09/while-kim-davis-was-illegally-put-in-jail-obama-did-this/#PlhU4bqhzWEILszD.99

Kim Davis

The Obama administration follows the Rahm Emanuel sentiments at every turn in taking advantage of a crisis. The illegal jailing of Kim Davis for following the law and ignoring an unlawful order from Bush appointed pro-sodomite Judge David Bunning was used as cover for the Obama administration to illegally plan regulation, which is imposing law (something the Executive Branch has not been given authority in the Constitution to do), to pay for mutilation surgeries for mentally ill men and women who think they are the opposite gender.

The Daily Caller reports:

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced a planned new regulation Thursday that will require health insurers participating in Obamacare to cover more health procedures sought by the transgendered.

The new rule applies to every health insurer offering plans through Healthcare.gov or any of the state-run Obamacare insurance exchanges. It declares that insurers are prohibited from engaging in discrimination not only on the basis of sex, but also on the basis of gender identity.

Complete Message

In the past, several health insurance plans have categorically excluded health care related to transitioning between genders, often on the grounds that such procedures are often cosmetic, not medically necessary, and elective in nature. Now, such categorical bans will be disallowed, and insurers will have to cover many of the procedures.

HHS says the new rule won’t require insurers to cover all hormone treatments or sex reassignment surgeries, but it will almost certainly require them to cover a large number of them.What did you say 07.jpg

First, let’s put in place that the Executive Branch is acting unconstitutionally. Article 1, Section 1 of the US Constitution reads:

All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.

How much power for legislation is left for the Executive Branch? How about for the federal courts? None, zero, zip, nada. The Congress has not passed any legislation that requires paying for mutilation surgeries or hormone treatments for mentally ill people under the judgment of God (Romans 1:18ff). Therefore, the Executive Branch has no authority to issue such a rule against health insurers. They are usurping it.

Why don’t the insurance companies band together and tell the feds to go pound sand?

“We are not requiring coverage for gender transition surgery,” said Jocelyn Samuels, director of the Office for Civil Rights at HHS, who makes me wonder for the appearance if she is not some sort of transgendered person. “We are simply saying that insurers must apply nondiscriminatory treatment … if they all exclude all gender identity treatment that will be a violation of the law.”Lies Lies and More Lies

Well, Samuels can say that all she likes, but the reality is that the federal government, under the Constitution, has no authority to tell anyone who they may or may not discriminate. We discriminate all the time. It’s protected in the First Amendment under the idea of peaceably assembling. We assemble with those of like mind and discriminate from assembling with those we are against ideologically.

How is Samuels attempting to justify her claims?

CNBC reports, “As an example, Samuels said the department would question a decision by an insurer to deny coverage to a person for a hysterectomy—the removal of ones’ uterus—if it were recommended by their doctor as part of a gender dysphoria diagnosis, and if that insurer covered hysterectomies for other diagnosed reasons.”

Wait, so a hysterectomy is equivalent to a man who thinks he is a woman and wants to cut his privates off and have breast augmentation? Seriously? See what a reprobate mind does people? See why those who encourage reprobate minds are also worthy of the same punishment as the reprobates? This is insanity!insane

And at the end of the day, who will pay for all of this? That’s right, you Mr. and Mrs. America, because it will be money that will be added to your premiums and, of course, with the people in the illegal Obamacare program, there is no doubt that taxpayers will be on the hook for some of the costs as well.

So, the criminals continue to run the show while the rightful governors, the people, stand back and allow it. I’m wondering just how long it’s going to take the people to pull out the pitchforks, torches, tar and feathers and, of course, exercise their rights under the Second Amendment to “secure a free state.”

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Bipartisan House Resolution Calls For Purple Hearts For Those Killed In Chattanooga


waving flagReported by Photo of Kerry Picket Kerry Picket, Reporter, 07/28/2015

URL of the original posting site: http://dailycaller.com/2015/07/28/bipartisan-house-resolution-calls-for-purple-hearts-for-those-killed-in-chattanooga
U.S. flag flies alongside a sign in honor of the four Marines killed in Chattanooga, Tenn., July 17, 2015. (REUTERS/Tami Chappell)

U.S. flag flies alongside a sign in honor of the four Marines killed in Chattanooga, Tenn., July 17, 2015. (REUTERS/Tami Chappell)

WASHINGTON — In an effort to expedite the awarding of purple hearts to the four Marines and Navy sailor killed in Chattanooga last week, Tennessee Rep. Chuck Fleischmann proposed a bipartisan House resolution to award the decoration to the military personnel. “It’s a resolution really calling for a sense of Congress to encourage all of the parties, who have say in the process, to award our five fallen heroes in uniform who have died purple hearts,” Fleischmann told The Daily Caller Monday. “We don’t want a situation similar to what happened with the heroes who got killed at Fort Hood and they had to wait a very long time to get a purple heart.”

Nidal Malik Hasan fatally shot and killed 13 service members and injured 30 others in 2009 at the Fort Hood Army Base in Texas. The Obama administration refused to call the incident an act of terrorism and therefore denying those killed and wounded Purple Hearts for six years after the tragic events.

Despite the FBI currently calling the gunman, Mohammed Abdulazeez, who killed all five men in Chattanooga a “homegrown violent extremist” as opposed to a terrorist, the resolution will state that Abdulazeez’s actions constituted a terrorist act.

“We are affirmatively stating in there that this was a terrorist act. And it’s my hope that the FBI classifies it as such. I classify it as such. When someone does what this shooter did at two locations to cause such horrific terror and carnage, to me that’s an act of terrorism and I think it must be deemed so.

However, ultimately, Congress is not the final arbiter of what is considered to be a terrorist act; the Executive branch makes that final call a Congressional aide noted. The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2015 allows the Purple Heart to be awarded “to a member of the Armed Forces killed or wounded in an attack inspired or motivated by a foreign terrorist organization.”

The Daily Caller placed an inquiry to The White House and did not receive a response as to whether the president will allow the five members of the military killed in Chattanooga to be awarded the Purple Heart.

“I think right now the FBI is trying to get further Proof as to whether it was a — they opened it as a terrorism case. My argument would be if it is an act of terrorism on American soil, they deserve the Purple Heart. Major Hassan admitted he was a terrorist. And it was a terrorist act,” Chairman of the Homeland Security Committee Mike McCaul told TheDC.

“I think in this case so far we have seen his online radicalization with Anwar Alaki and other militant sites. I think for Purple Heart purposes, it would probably be good to see the investigation play out. But in my judgment this guy is a terrorist. He was ISIS-inspired,” McCaul added.

The Purple Heart also includes medical benefits to wounded military as well as surviving family members of killed in action military members. Fleischman’s resolution would ensure that the benefits would also be included along with Purple Heart honors.

“I actually spoke to the Department of Defense to day and told them we were going to be doing a resolution and, obviously, they’re going to review that, but it’s my understanding that the Marines have already prepared packets,” Fleishman said. “We had four Marines and one Navy sailor killed. In addition to that, there was an additional service person wounded and this would also make him eligible.”Heart

muslim-obamaHouse Armed Services Committee member Louisiana Rep. John Fleming says that Congress will likely have to go through both the Department of Defense as well as State Department to get the ball rolling, but it will be difficult to legislate something that the president can only decide. Fleming also wonders why it took the president five days to call for the lowering of the American flag to half mast on government buildings to honor those killed in Chattanooga.

“These men lost their lives and there was a delay of lowering the flag at half staff and it is just inexplicable. And certainly we should decorate them and acknowledge them for what they do and sacrifices they make,” Flemming said. “They were in the line of duty. They we’re doing what they do in the military by recruiting. It wasn’t as if they were in a grocery store or something. They were targeted as military members.”

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