The Front Page Cover
~ Featuring ~
Trump, Immigration and the Supreme Court
by Judge Andrew Napolitano
.
. EPA Rolling Back liar-nObama's 'Clean Water Act'
On Tuesday, the Environmental Protection Agency began acting on Donald Trump's campaign promise to repeal the 2015 "Waters of the United States" regulation. The controversial and onerous regulation created by Barack liar-nObama's EPA commissars essentially stretched the definition of "water way" to encompass almost any and every source of surface water, no matter how small. The draconian regulation enacted one of the largest governmental power grabs in the nation's history, severely infringing the private property rights of Americans all across the country.
The first step in what the EPA says will be a two-step processes will be a rollback of the liar-nObama regulations and a return to 2008 standards. The second step will be to create new waterway regulations designed to preserve the property rights of Americans, as well as protect business interests and the environment. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt stated, "We are taking significant action to return power to the states and provide regulatory certainty to our nation's farmers and businesses." He continued, "This is the first step in the two-step process to redefine 'waters of the U.S.' and we are committed to moving through this re-evaluation to quickly provide regulatory certainty, in a way that is thoughtful, transparent and collaborative with other agencies and the public."
Predictably, ecofascist groups shouted their outrage at the EPA's announcement, suggesting that Trump was primarily interested in promoting business at the expense of the environment. "It goes without saying that the Trump administration doesn't care about the environment, public health, or its duty to protect our most precious natural resources — and that is why it's up to us, the American people, to hold them accountable," pontificated Sierra Club executive director Michael Brune. "We will fight this and every other attempt by polluters and the Trump administration to destroy our water resources."
Supporters, however, praised the news. Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) said, "Today marks the beginning of restoring private property rights while protecting our environment. Out-of-state DC bureaucrats shouldn't impose regulations that hurt Montana farmers, ranchers and landowners." The EPA plans to publish the new regulation proposals within days. Finally, a government agency is concerned primarily about preserving Americans' rights, not simply engaging in its own acquisition of power.
~The Patriot Post
.
.
Evidence liar-nObama, FBI Arranged, Financed
liar-Clinton Anti-Trump Research During Election
by Rick Wells
{rickwells.us} ~ Dick Morris addresses what appears to be a likely occurrence in which the FBI paid for the smears that liar-Hillary Clinton used against President Trump during the campaign, and then expanded upon them, in concert with James Comey... Those later became this whole Russia collusion fabrication and obsession. He describes how liar-Clinton, unable to take then candidate Trump down with a barrage of dirty tricks, became desperate and realized she was going to need something different. He says, “She turned to trying to make something of the Russian meddling in the campaign which she thought happened when they hacked the DNC computers. We’re not clear that they did yet but let’s assume that they did. So her supporters hired a group called Fusion GPS, who hired an ex-spy named Christopher Steele, from, British spy, to dig up dirt and to establish that there was collusion between Trump and Putin to fix the election.” Morris says, “But when you look at some of the evidence, it looks like the FBI may have actually paid for the development of negative research on Donald Trump, during the election; that they may have actually used tax money to pay for liar-Hillary’s negative research... http://rickwells.us/morris-evidence-obama-fbi-arranged-financed-clinton-anti-trump-research-election/
The Relevance of the “Collusion
with Russia Isn’t a Crime” Argument
by Andrew McCarthy
{aim.org} ~ Jonah, I imagine I was one of the first commentators to posit the argument that “collusion with Russia” without further defining what ‘collusion’ means isn’t a crime... There are two reasons why the argument remains relevant. Although it could be argued that one is moot, I don’t think it is, for reasons I’ll get to. It’s interesting that we are seeing the argument pop up more often now. When I first advanced it, there was a very specific purpose. The federal regulations governing when (a) a “special counsel” should be appointed, and (b) a Justice Department lawyer including the attorney general is disqualified from participation in a matter, do not apply unless conduct occurs that warrants a criminal investigation — i.e., there needs to be a crime. Because special counsels or their precursors, special prosecutors and independent counsels can so undermine an administration’s capacity to govern, I was arguing that, in the absence of some solid evidence that a crime had been committed, there was no basis in law to appoint one...http://www.aim.org/guest-column/the-relevance-of-the-collusion-with-russia-isnt-a-crime-argument/?utm_source=AIM+-+Daily+Email&utm_campaign=Daily%20Email%20Jun-29-2017&utm_medium=email.
Russia probe pile-on: No fewer than
9 teams investigating collusion, meddling
by Cody Derespina
{foxnews.com} ~ The expansive investigation into Russian meddling and possible collusion with Trump associates has grown so vast that no fewer than nine congressional committees and federal agencies are now examining some offshoot of the controversy... And despite the inquiries to date having produced no indictments or hard evidence of collusion between the president's men and a foreign power, even more officials and entities are looking to bite off a piece of the probe. “The main problem is that after months and months of multiple investigations, no one has found any evidence of collusion,” a congressional source told Fox News. “So the Democrats are trying to shift the focus from collusion to obstruction, and since it doesn’t look like that will pan out for them either, they surely have some new accusation ready to put out there. It’s in their political interest to drag out these investigations as long as possible.”... http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/06/29/russia-probe-pile-on-no-fewer-than-9-teams-investigating-collusion-meddling.html?cmpid=NL_fntop.
House passes Kate’s Law, as
part of illegal immigrant crackdown
by foxnews.com
{foxnews.com} ~ House Republicans took action Thursday to crack down on illegal immigrants and the cities that shelter them... One bill passed by the House would deny federal grants to sanctuary cities and another, Kate’s Law, would increase the penalties for deported aliens who try to return to the United States. Kate's Law, which would increase the penalties for deported aliens who try to return to the United States and caught, passed with a vote of 257 to 157, with one Republican voting no and 24 Democrats voting yes... http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/06/29/house-to-vote-on-kate-s-law-as-part-illegal-immigrant-crackdown.html.
PODESTA LIES About Own
Shady RUSSIA Energy Schemes
by Rick Wells
{rickwells.us} ~ liar-Hillary Clinton’s former campaign chairman, John Podesta, testified Tuesday before the House Intelligence Committee behind closed doors... They were supposedly doing so in the never-ending investigation of the concocted issue of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign. That was the easy part. On Thursday he made an appearance on Maria Bartiromo’s program where some real questions were asked. Bartiromo asks Podesta to describe in general terms the substance of his testimony, which he described as “what had happened to me and what the effect of, uh, was on the campaign, the Russian interference in our democratic process. And they’re probing what actually happened, whether there was collusion and what are we going to do about it.” After he completes his rambling little narrative about the history of the witch hunt, Bartiromo gets right to it, asking... http://rickwells.us/bartiromo-grills-podesta-lies-shady-russia-energy-schemes/
.
.
by Judge Andrew Napolitano
{townhall.com} ~ Earlier this week, after nearly uniform rejections by judges all across the country, President Donald Trump achieved a court victory in the persistent challenges to his most recent executive order restricting the immigration of people into the United States from six predominately Muslim countries. Lower federal courts had consistently ruled that the president's behavior was animated by an anti-Muslim bias -- a bias he forcefully articulated during the presidential election campaign -- concluding that what appeared to be, on its face, a travel ban based rationally on national security needs was in reality a "Muslim ban" based on religious fear, prejudice or hatred.
The Supreme Court unanimously saw it differently. Here is the back story.
I have argued for months that both the first travel ban executive order, signed Jan. 27, and the second one, signed March 6, were lawful and constitutional because the courts have ruled that the Constitution gives the president exclusively the final say on foreign policy and because they have ruled that immigration is one of the tools he can use to effectuate that policy. Moreover, Congress has expressly authorized the president to suspend immigration from stated countries for finite periods of time to enhance national security.
In order to do this and pass judicial muster, the president's lawyers in the Department of Justice need only show that the president has a rational basis for his order. Trump argued that his rational basis was a determination by the State Department under former President Barack liar-nObama, reinforced by his own State Department, that immigrants who would cause harm once here in the U.S. are more likely than not to come from the six designated countries in the second order -- Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
The traditional Judeo-Christian view of governmental decisions that limit the liberties or opportunities of many because of the anticipated behavior of a few is that those decisions are unjust and need not be obeyed. Indeed, in America -- in our post-Civil War and post-civil rights eras -- we have come to the political and legal consensus that individual worthiness is personal and is not a characteristic of a group, and we have condemned other countries' governments for punishing the many because of the fear or behavior of a few. Yet the issue before the high court regarding the president's executive order is not its wisdom or morality or justness. The issue is its lawfulness and its constitutionality.
If an executive order is based on a denial of a fundamental liberty other than travel -- speech or religion, for example -- then the DOJ has a much higher bar to meet, called strict scrutiny. Those of us who monitor these things have fairly well concluded that it cannot meet that high bar. Stated differently, if the high court concludes that the travel ban is really a Muslim ban, the court will invalidate the ban -- which every court to review it before the Supreme Court did.
In the first challenge to the president's first order, a federal district court in Seattle ruled that it was based on religion, and the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that ruling. Rather than appeal that to the Supreme Court, the president signed the second executive order -- which imposed the same restrictions as the first, but in more thoughtful, cautious and lawyerlike language.
The second executive order was challenged in federal district courts in Honolulu and Annapolis, both of which ruled that it, too, was based on religion, and therefore they invalidated it. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond upheld the Annapolis decision, and the 9th Circuit in San Francisco upheld the Honolulu decision. The DOJ appealed both circuit court rulings to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court intervened.
Bear in mind that there has been no trial in any of these cases. The rulings appealed from were all preliminary in nature, based not on cross-examined evidence but on the judges' feel for the cases and their understanding of the law. The same is the case with the Supreme Court ruling. It did not say what the law is and what burdens the government must meet for the court to uphold the second executive order. But it did invalidate all injunctions imposed by the lower courts against the enforcement of the second order.
In so doing, it carved out exceptions to the executive order. These judicially created exceptions provide that immigrants from the six countries are exempt from the travel ban if they can show that they have a "relationship" with a person or entity in the U.S. Though the word "relationship" is ambiguous, it can range from a job offer to a university admissions offer to a business opportunity to an anxious family member awaiting the immigrant in the United States.
This judge-made exception to the president's foreign policy was probably a compromise crafted by Chief Justice John Roberts intended to bring the liberal and conservative wings of the court to agreement on the limited issue of whether the second executive order can be in place and enforced by the government during the time that the court needs to examine it.
Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissented on the exemptions. They argued that the court has no business or right interfering with the president's foreign policy and that the "relationship" standard is so vague that it will spawn thousands of litigations. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument on the power of the president to use immigration travel bans as an instrument of foreign policy in October and will probably rule before Christmas.
And then those who want to challenge the president in court will be able to contest the law as the Supreme Court will articulate it. And this troublesome business of banning people from coming here because of their place of origin will be with us for a long time.
Trump, Immigration and the Supreme Court
{townhall.com} ~ Earlier this week, after nearly uniform rejections by judges all across the country, President Donald Trump achieved a court victory in the persistent challenges to his most recent executive order restricting the immigration of people into the United States from six predominately Muslim countries. Lower federal courts had consistently ruled that the president's behavior was animated by an anti-Muslim bias -- a bias he forcefully articulated during the presidential election campaign -- concluding that what appeared to be, on its face, a travel ban based rationally on national security needs was in reality a "Muslim ban" based on religious fear, prejudice or hatred.
The Supreme Court unanimously saw it differently. Here is the back story.
I have argued for months that both the first travel ban executive order, signed Jan. 27, and the second one, signed March 6, were lawful and constitutional because the courts have ruled that the Constitution gives the president exclusively the final say on foreign policy and because they have ruled that immigration is one of the tools he can use to effectuate that policy. Moreover, Congress has expressly authorized the president to suspend immigration from stated countries for finite periods of time to enhance national security.
In order to do this and pass judicial muster, the president's lawyers in the Department of Justice need only show that the president has a rational basis for his order. Trump argued that his rational basis was a determination by the State Department under former President Barack liar-nObama, reinforced by his own State Department, that immigrants who would cause harm once here in the U.S. are more likely than not to come from the six designated countries in the second order -- Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
The traditional Judeo-Christian view of governmental decisions that limit the liberties or opportunities of many because of the anticipated behavior of a few is that those decisions are unjust and need not be obeyed. Indeed, in America -- in our post-Civil War and post-civil rights eras -- we have come to the political and legal consensus that individual worthiness is personal and is not a characteristic of a group, and we have condemned other countries' governments for punishing the many because of the fear or behavior of a few. Yet the issue before the high court regarding the president's executive order is not its wisdom or morality or justness. The issue is its lawfulness and its constitutionality.
If an executive order is based on a denial of a fundamental liberty other than travel -- speech or religion, for example -- then the DOJ has a much higher bar to meet, called strict scrutiny. Those of us who monitor these things have fairly well concluded that it cannot meet that high bar. Stated differently, if the high court concludes that the travel ban is really a Muslim ban, the court will invalidate the ban -- which every court to review it before the Supreme Court did.
In the first challenge to the president's first order, a federal district court in Seattle ruled that it was based on religion, and the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that ruling. Rather than appeal that to the Supreme Court, the president signed the second executive order -- which imposed the same restrictions as the first, but in more thoughtful, cautious and lawyerlike language.
The second executive order was challenged in federal district courts in Honolulu and Annapolis, both of which ruled that it, too, was based on religion, and therefore they invalidated it. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond upheld the Annapolis decision, and the 9th Circuit in San Francisco upheld the Honolulu decision. The DOJ appealed both circuit court rulings to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court intervened.
Bear in mind that there has been no trial in any of these cases. The rulings appealed from were all preliminary in nature, based not on cross-examined evidence but on the judges' feel for the cases and their understanding of the law. The same is the case with the Supreme Court ruling. It did not say what the law is and what burdens the government must meet for the court to uphold the second executive order. But it did invalidate all injunctions imposed by the lower courts against the enforcement of the second order.
In so doing, it carved out exceptions to the executive order. These judicially created exceptions provide that immigrants from the six countries are exempt from the travel ban if they can show that they have a "relationship" with a person or entity in the U.S. Though the word "relationship" is ambiguous, it can range from a job offer to a university admissions offer to a business opportunity to an anxious family member awaiting the immigrant in the United States.
This judge-made exception to the president's foreign policy was probably a compromise crafted by Chief Justice John Roberts intended to bring the liberal and conservative wings of the court to agreement on the limited issue of whether the second executive order can be in place and enforced by the government during the time that the court needs to examine it.
Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch dissented on the exemptions. They argued that the court has no business or right interfering with the president's foreign policy and that the "relationship" standard is so vague that it will spawn thousands of litigations. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument on the power of the president to use immigration travel bans as an instrument of foreign policy in October and will probably rule before Christmas.
And then those who want to challenge the president in court will be able to contest the law as the Supreme Court will articulate it. And this troublesome business of banning people from coming here because of their place of origin will be with us for a long time.
Comments