I’m not a Biden supporter, but I think it’s highly likely that his intent was to refer only to Trump, but he fumbled while speaking, as we humans often do. I’m going to give Biden the benefit of the doubt, and believe that he meant to only refer to Trump.
https://x.com/DanielAlmanPGH/status/1852306749757268270
https://www.snopes.com/news/2024/10/30/biden-trump-supporters-garbage/
Did Biden Call Trump’s Supporters Garbage? Was Biden talking about all of Trump’s supporters or only one of them?
October 30, 2024
In a sharp rebuke of comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s characterization of Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage” during a rally for Republican former U.S. President Donald Trump, Democratic President Joe Biden made a remark that appeared to characterize Trump supporters as “garbage.”
Controversy arose not only because Trump’s supporters took offense at what they heard, but because the White House released a transcript offering a different take on what Biden said or meant to say.
Specifically, the controversy hinged on whether Biden said “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters,” plural, meaning all of Trump’s supporters, or “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporter’s,” possessive singular, meaning Hinchcliffe’s “garbage” about Puerto Rico.
Neither version was implausible.
Neither the Biden administration, nor the city government of Aurora, Colorado, has done anything to stop this armed gang of illegal aliens from terrorizing residents of this apartment building.
https://x.com/DanielAlmanPGH/status/1829153230670180515
https://www.yahoo.com/news/video-shows-armed-gang-troubled-070023974.html
Video shows armed gang at troubled Colorado apartment building believed to have been taken over by migrants
By Jasmine Baehr
August 29, 2024
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2F4cArA3uc
Potential gang activity was caught on surveillance camera in a Colorado apartment building after what one former resident calls “no accountability” kept law enforcement from assisting.
The video shows many men armed with handguns, and one with a scoped rifle, bursting through the door of the apartment complex for unknown reasons.
The group appears to be Tren de Aragua, or TdA, a transnational gang based out of Venezuela. The gang, with reportedly 5,000 members, has a motto of “real until death,” or “real hasta la muerte.”
TdA is now linked with over 100 crimes across the nation, according to reporting from the New York Post.
Aurora City Councilwoman Danielle Jurinsky said in an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital that “without a doubt that there is sex trafficking now going on” in relationship to TdA’s activities in the city.
“This is organized. They patrol the property with guns visibly, like they’re not trying to hide them. There’s no repercussion. These are ghosts,” said one resident who spoke with Fox News Digital on the condition of anonymity.
The gang has also been seen dealing drugs in the same apartment building, according to this resident.
The resident, who moved out of the overtaken apartment building on Wednesday afternoon with the assistance of City Council Member Danielle Jurinsky and congressional candidate John Fabbricatore, said to Fox News Digital that “I literally had to borrow from everybody I know to get into a new place. And it’s every bit of money I had.”
She also credits Fox News with her move out of the troubled complex, saying “Through the help of Fox News actually, they connected us with the councilwoman who, Danielle Jurinsky, pulled together all the resources to get us some help and get us out of there.”
Aurora Police released a statement via X, saying “we believe reports of TdA influence in Aurora are isolated.”
Nearby Denver Police told FOX 31 on Wednesday that they were “not aware” of any apartment takeovers by gangs in the area.
“There’s no safety net for you because the police are not coming. They say, ‘stay inside and lock your doors.’ I have to work! I was paying rent, these people haven’t been paying rent at all. I’ve been paying rent every month for years,” the resident told Fox News Digital.
In an exclusive interview with Fox News Digital, Aurora City Council Member Danielle Jurinsky said, “In the entire Denver metro area, it has been like pulling teeth to get anyone, the media, other elected officials, to get anyone to acknowledge the presence of this trend and to acknowledge that there is even a problem.”
“I hope [the police] do something because they could have helped me get out. Literally. Their answer for me was, ‘you ever think about moving?’ That’s what they told me when I was like, and I started crying,” recalled the resident.
“There’s no help coming for any of us. The police have checked out. They’re not on our side.”
Democrats allowed a known serial killer who murdered 23 people to enter the U.S.
https://x.com/DanielAlmanPGH/status/1824495114372387197
Reputed Peruvian gang leader arrested in NY as suspect wanted for 23 killings in his home country
By Associated Press
August 15, 2024
A reputed Peruvian gang leader suspected in nearly two dozen killings in his home country was arrested Wednesday in New York by U.S. immigration authorities.
Gianfranco Torres-Navarro, the leader of “Los Killers” who is wanted for 23 killings in his home country, was arrested in Endicott, New York, about 145 miles (233 kilometers) northwest of New York City, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said Thursday.
He is being held at a federal detention facility near Buffalo pending an immigration hearing, Immigration and Customs Enforcement said.
Torres-Navarro, 38, entered the U.S. illegally at the Texas-Mexico border on May 16.
He was arrested the same day and given a notice to appear for immigration proceedings, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said.
The agency, known as ICE, said it moved to arrest Torres-Navarro after receiving information on July 8 that he was wanted in Peru.
“Gianfranco Torres-Navarro poses a significant threat to our communities, and we won’t allow New York to be a safe haven for dangerous noncitizens,” said Thomas Brophy, the director of enforcement removal operations for ICE’s Buffalo field office.
Immigration agents also arrested Torres-Navarro’s girlfriend, Mishelle Sol Ivanna Ortíz Ubillús, described by Peruvian authorities as his right hand. She is being held at a processing center in Pennsylvania, according to ICE’s Online Detainee Locator System.
Peru’s justice system confirmed to The Associated Press that it ordered the location and international capture of Torres-Navarro and his partner Ortiz-Ubilluz on July 3.
According to Peruvian authorities, Torres-Navarro is the leader of a criminal organization known as “Los Killers de Ventanilla y Callao” that has used violence to thwart rivals seeking to cut into its core business of extorting construction companies.
Torres-Navarro allegedly fled Peru after the killing of retired police officer Cesar Quegua Herrera at a restaurant in San Miguel in March, Peruvian media reported.
Six reputed members of “Los Killers,” formed in 2022 in an area along the Pacific coast where Peru’s main port is located, were arrested in a series of raids in June and accused of homicide, contract killing, and extortion, the National Police of Peru said.
Torres-Navarro was previously a member of the Los Malditos de Angamos criminal organization, Peru’s Public Prosecutor’s Office said.
He is also known as “Gianfranco 23,” a reference to the number of people he is alleged to have killed.
His girlfriend, Ortiz Ubillús, has a prominent role in “Los Killers,” Peruvian authorities said.
The Public Prosecutor’s Office described her as Torres Navarro’s romantic partner, lieutenant and cashier.
She also has a sizable following on the social media platform TikTok where she showed off their lavish lifestyle, including designer clothes, resort vacations and shooting targets at a gun range.
Biden’s $7.5 billion investment in EV charging has only produced 7 stations in two years
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/2024/03/28/ev-charging-stations-slow-rollout/
Biden’s $7.5 billion investment in EV charging has only produced 7 stations in two years
By Shannon Osaka
March 29, 2024
President Biden has long vowed to build 500,000 electric vehicle charging stations in the United States by 2030. Those stations, the White House said, would help Americans feel confident purchasing and driving electric cars, and help the country cut carbon pollution.
But now, more than two years after Congress allocated $7.5 billion to help build out those stations, only 7 EV charging stations are operational across four states.
MSNBC on Biden’s cognitive abilities: “Biden is far beyond cogent. He is better than he has EVER been intellectually, analytically. He is the best ever.” This was just 3 months ago.
https://x.com/EndWokeness/status/1806652543084220731
In my opinion, Biden won the debate, based on this.
https://x.com/DanielAlmanPGH/status/1807117058741588336
Watch from 1:21:37 to 1:22:08
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-v-8wJkmwBY
https://www.cnn.com/2024/06/27/politics/read-biden-trump-debate-rush-transcript/index.html
BIDEN: “Yeah, I would. The idea that somehow we are this failing country, I never heard a president talk like this before. We – we’re the envy of the world. Name me a single major country president who wouldn’t trade places with the United States of America. For all our problems and all our opportunities, we’re the most progressive country in the world in getting things done. We’re the strongest country in the world. We’re a country in the world who keeps our word and everybody trusts us, all of our allies.”
Why does Biden want the U.S., and not Singapore, to pay for a U.S. bridge that was destroyed by a Singaporean ship?
https://twitter.com/DanielAlmanPGH/status/1772756791408959611
I’m against using taxpayers’ money to fly rapists into the U.S.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/jordan-opens-house-probe-haitian-114007862.html
Jordan opens House probe into how Haitian migrant charged with raping girl at Massachusetts shelter came to US
By Danielle Wallace, Chad Pergram, and Kelly Phares
March 20, 2024
House Judiciary Committee Republicans are demanding that Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas provide information on how a Haitian migrant charged with raping a disabled teen girl at a Massachusetts state shelter entered the United States and who sponsored him to come here.
Committee Chair Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, and Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., who chairs the Subcommittee on Immigration, Integrity, Security and Enforcement, jointly penned a letter to Mayorkas on Tuesday regarding their investigation into 26-year-old Cory Alvarez. On March 13, police in Rockland, Mass., arrested Alvarez, a Haitian national, “in connection with a vicious assault on a disabled ‘15-year-old girl,’” the letter obtained by Fox News says.
“According to press reports, in June 2023, Alvarez was ‘fl[own] directly from Haiti to John F. Kennedy Airport in New York City’ as part of the Biden Administration’s illegal categorical parole program known as CHNV that ‘allows up to 30,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans to fly into the U.S.’ each month,” the letter says.
Fact check: Biden makes three false claims about his handling of classified information
Fact check: Biden makes three false claims about his handling of classified information
By Daniel Dale
February 9, 2024
President Joe Biden gave a press conference Thursday night after the release of a report from special counsel Robert Hur, who announced that Biden would not face charges over his handling of classified information from prior to his presidency.
Biden was combative, forcefully rejecting Hur’s claims that he has a poor memory. But the president was also repeatedly inaccurate, making three claims that were clearly contradicted by Hur’s report.
Here is a fact check.
Where the classified material was stored
Biden sought to contrast his handling of classified material with that of former President Donald Trump, who faces felony charges for willfully retaining classified documents. (Hur agreed that there were major distinctions between the two cases.) But while Biden correctly noted that the documents were in a private home that is very different from the Mar-a-Lago social club where Trump lives, Biden embellished his argument with a false claim.
Biden said: “All the stuff that was in my home was in filing cabinets that were either locked or able to be locked.”
Facts First: Biden’s claim is not true. The special counsel’s report says that while some of the classified documents were found in cabinet drawers in Biden’s Delaware home, other classified documents, about Afghanistan, were found in an “unsealed” and “badly damaged” box sitting in his garage alongside an assortment of other items the special counsel described as “household detritus.” The report includes a photo of the box.
Hur wrote that investigators looked into the possibility that the Afghanistan-related documents found in the box were previously stored in a filing cabinet when Biden lived in a rented home in Virginia before moving out in 2019. Hur called that line of inquiry “inconclusive.” Regardless, Biden’s Thursday claim that “all” of the documents in his home were in locked or lockable filing cabinets is not true of his current home.
According to the special counsel, even classified documents Biden was storing elsewhere in his home were insufficiently secure. Hur wrote that Biden notebooks containing classified information from his vice presidency were found by investigators in “unlocked drawers in the office and basement den” of the home. Hur wrote that Biden “should have known” that as a private citizen as of 2017, “he was not permitted to keep handwritten notes about the President’s Daily Brief and other classified information in unlocked drawers in his home.”
At a White House briefing on Friday, Ian Sams, a spokesperson for the White House Counsel’s Office, would not directly answer when asked about Biden’s claims about the security of the documents held at his home.
“Look, I think the president was trying to address a number of inaccurate allegations in this … report,” Sams told CNN’s MJ Lee. “I don’t have anything … to add on what he said last night.”
Asked later whether he was saying the special counsel’s report was inaccurate about the storage of documents, Sams again avoided responding directly.
“The report lays out in 400 pages of detail all of the evidence and all of the review that they conducted in looking into this matter,” he said. “The president made sure that all of the classified documents that were found were returned promptly to the government, which is what you’re supposed to do, which is why this is the inevitable conclusion that there is no case here.”
When the reporter pressed Sams, saying that wasn’t a response to his question, Sams replied: “I understand what you’re trying to ask.” He did not respond further to the question.
The classification level of the documents Biden had in his possession
Biden claimed of the documents he possessed: “None of it was high classified. It didn’t have any of that red stuff on it, you know what I mean, around the corners? None of that.”
Facts First: Biden’s claim that none of the classified material found in his possession was highly classified is false, according to details provided by the special counsel. Hur reported the discovery of documents in Biden’s possession that had markings identifying them as “Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information,” a very high level of classification – plus handwritten notebooks from Biden’s time as vice president that weren’t marked as classified but that “contain information that remains classified up to the Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information level.”
It’s not clear whether any of the marked classified documents found in Biden’s possession had the colored borders seen on some of the marked classified documents found in Trump’s possession, which is what Biden appeared to be referring to when he spoke about “that red stuff…around the corners.” Regardless, Hur explained at length that some of the documents were marked as Top Secretand some with other notations identifying them as highly classified.
For example, Hur wrote, the open box in Biden’s garage contained an Afghanistan-related memo from the National Security Adviser to President Barack Obama in 2009 marked “TOP SECRET/SCI” (Sensitive Compartmented Information). Hur wrote that experts in the intelligence community said the document contains “highly sensitive information about the military programs of the United States and a foreign government. The unauthorized disclosure of this information, both today and in 2017 when Mr. Biden was no longer vice president, reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security.”
Hur wrote that the box in the garage contained another 2009 memo from the National Security Adviser to Obama marked “TOP SECRET WITH TOP SECRET/NOFORN/CODEWORD ATTACHMENTS” with attachments, one of which was marked “TOP SECRET//HUMINT/COMINT//ORCON/NOFORN//FISA.”Hur wrote that experts said “portions of this document contain national defense information about sensitive intelligence sources and methods.”
In addition, Hur wrote that notebooks with handwritten notes Biden took during his vice presidency contained information on “U.S. intelligence sources, methods, and capabilities,” “U.S. intelligence activities” and “the activities of foreign intelligence services,” among other things. Hur wrote that when investigators looked into a sampling of 37 excerpts from Biden’s handwritten materials that appeared to be classified, they found that “eight are Top Secret with Sensitive Compartmented Information, seven of which include information concerning human intelligence sources,” while six are Top Secret alone, 21 Secret and two Confidential.
“Mr. Biden wrote down obviously sensitive information discussed during intelligence briefings with then President Obama and meetings in the White House Situation Room about matters of national security and military and foreign policy,” Hur wrote.
What Hur said Biden said to his ghostwriter
Hur said in the report that Biden disclosed classified material from his notebooks to the ghostwriter, Mark Zwonitzer, who worked with him on a 2017 memoir called “Promise Me, Dad.” But Biden categorically denied that he had shared classified information with the ghostwriter, saying he can “guarantee” he didn’t.
When a reporter responded that the special counsel said he did, Biden responded, “No, they did not say that. He did not say that.”
Facts First: Biden’s claim is false. Hur did say that, writing explicitly that “Mr. Biden shared information, including some classified information, from those notebooks with his ghostwriter.” He elaborated that Biden shared classified information with his ghostwriter by reading “nearly verbatim” from his notebooks “on at least three occasions,” including his “notes from meetings in the Situation Room.”
Hur did find, however, that Biden “at times” tried to avoid sharing classified information, by stopping at or skipping over certain material from the notebooks. And he wrote that “the evidence does not show that when Mr. Biden shared the specific passages with his ghostwriter, Mr. Biden knew the passages were classified and intended to share classified information.”
Hur wrote that in one recorded conversation with the ghostwriter in 2017, at the Virginia home where Biden then lived, Biden read from his notebook about a National Security Council meeting about Iraq in 2015, then told the ghostwriter about a 2009 memo he had written to Obama arguing against the deployment of more troops to Afghanistan – and then said, “I just found all the classified stuff downstairs.” Hur noted that more than five years later, investigators found classified documents about the Afghanistan troop surge in Biden’s Delaware garage.
Hur wrote that he has not heard of any allegations that classified material actually appeared in Biden’s 2017 memoir.
Biden won’t be charged in classified docs case; special counsel cites instances of ‘poor memory’
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/rcna96666
Biden won’t be charged in classified docs case; special counsel cites instances of ‘poor memory’
The decision caps off a yearlong saga and means Donald Trump remains the only president in history to face criminal charges.
By Ryan J. Reilly, Ken Dilanian, and Megan Lebowitz
February 8, 2024
WASHINGTON — Special counsel Robert Hur has declined to prosecute President Joe Biden for his handling of classified documents but said in a report released Thursday that Biden’s practices “present serious risks to national security” and added that part of the reason he wouldn’t charge Biden was that the president could portray himself as an “elderly man with a poor memory” who would be sympathetic to a jury.
“Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen,” the report said, but added that the evidence “does not establish Mr. Biden’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.”
The report from Hur — who previously appointed by former President Donald Trump as one of the country’s top federal prosecutors — also made clear the “material distinctions” between a theoretical case against Biden and the pending case against Trump for his handling of classified documents, noting the “serious aggravating facts” in Trump’s case.
Biden said in remarks from the White House after the report was made public that he was pleased that the report cleared him.
“The decision to decline criminal charges was straightforward,” Biden said.
He also said: “My memory’s fine.”
Hur’s report included several shocking lines about Biden’s memory, which the report said “was significantly limited” during his 2023 interviews with the special counsel. Biden’s age and presentation would make it more difficult to convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that the now-81-year-old was guilty of willfully committing a crime.
“We have also considered that, at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” it said. “Based on our direct interactions with and observations of him, he is someone for whom many jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt. It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him — by then a former president well into his eighties — of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.”
Later in the report, the special counsel said that the president’s memory was “worse” during an interview with him than it was in recorded conversations from 2017.
In a Monday letter to Hur and his deputy special counsel, Richard Sauber and Bob Bauer, Biden’s personal counsel, disputed how the report characterized the president’s memory.
“We do not believe that the report’s treatment of President Biden’s memory is accurate or appropriate,” Sauber and Bauer wrote in the letter, which was also released on Thursday. “The report uses highly prejudicial language to describe a commonplace occurrence among witnesses: a lack of recall of years-old events.”
“He did not remember when he was vice president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended (‘if it was 2013 — when did I stop being Vice President?’), and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term began (‘in 2009, am I still Vice President?’),” the report said.
Biden also had difficulty remembering the timing of his son Beau’s death, as well as a debate about Afghanistan, the report said.
“He did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died,” the report said.
Defenders of the president quickly pointed out that he sat for the interview in the days after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. Biden, giving previously scheduled remarks on Thursday, appeared to nod to that, saying, “I was in the middle of handling an international crisis.”
He also added that he was “especially pleased” that the special counsel “made clear the stark differences between this case and Donald Trump.”
Andrew Weissman, who served on special counsel Robert Mueller’s team, said on MSNBC on Thursday that Hur’s decision to lodge criticisms of Biden’s memory problems was “gratuitous” and reminded him of when former FBI Director James Comey held a press conference criticizing Hillary Clinton in the months before the 2016 election.
“This is not being charged. And yet a person goes out and gives their opinion with adjectives and adverbs about what they think, entirely inappropriate,” he said. “I think a really fair criticism of this is unfortunately, we’re seeing a redux of what we saw with respect to James Comey at the FBI with respect to Hillary Clinton in terms of really not adhering to what I think are the highest ideals of the Department of Justice.”
Separately, Sauber responded to the report by saying the White House is “pleased” it has concluded and that there were no criminal charges.
“As the Special Counsel report recognizes, the President fully cooperated from day one,” he said in a statement. “His team promptly self-reported the classified documents that were found to ensure that these documents were immediately returned to the government because the President knows that’s where they belong.”
Sauber went on to appear to criticize the report but raised no specific points.
“We disagree with a number of inaccurate and inappropriate comments in the Special Counsel’s report,” Sauber said in his statement. “Nonetheless, the most important decision the Special Counsel made — that no charges are warranted — is firmly based on the facts and evidence.”
Hur’s report said there were “clear” material distinctions between a potential case against Biden and the pending case against Trump, noting that unlike “the evidence involving Mr. Biden, the allegations set forth in the indictment of Mr. Trump, if proven, would present serious aggravating facts.”
Most notably, the report said, “after being given multiple chances to return classified documents and avoid prosecution, Mr. Trump allegedly did the opposite.” In contrast, it said, “Mr. Biden turned in classified documents to the National Archives and the Department of Justice, consented to the search of multiple locations including his homes, sat for a voluntary interview, and in other ways cooperated with the investigation.”
Some of the report focuses on documents about Afghanistan, from early in Barack Obama’s presidency. About a month after Biden left office as vice president, in a recorded conversation with his ghostwriter in February 2017, Biden remarked that he “just found all this classified stuff downstairs,” the report said. He told him, “Some of this may be classified, so be careful,” in one recording. Biden was believed to have been referring to classified documents about the Afghanistan troop surge in 2009, which Biden opposed.
The announcement tops off a lengthy saga that began in November 2022, after one of Biden’s personal attorneys found classified documents that appeared to be from the Obama administration at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement, which Biden had used as a personal office after his vice presidential term concluded. Classified documents were later also found at Biden’s Delaware home.
The existence of classified documents at Biden’s home and former office were first reported in January 2023. CBS News first reported the existence of the documents at the Penn Biden Center.
Attorney General Merrick Garland in January 2023 announced that he would appoint Hur as special counsel to oversee the investigation into Biden, saying the appointment authorized him “to investigate whether any person or entity violated the law in connection with this matter.”
Biden was interviewed in October as part of the investigation, the White House said. The interview was voluntary, according to White House spokesman Ian Sams.
“As we have said from the beginning, the President and the White House are cooperating with this investigation, and as it has been appropriate, we have provided relevant updates publicly, being as transparent as we can consistent with protecting and preserving the integrity of the investigation,” Sams said at the time.
NBC News has also previously reported that the special counsel had interviewed Hunter Biden as well, according to a source familiar with the matter.
With Hur’s announcement, Donald Trump remains the only president in history to face criminal charges, which include seven criminal charges in connection with mishandling classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago. According to the indictment in that case, Trump had more than 100 classified documents at his Florida home, including documents with “Top Secret” classification markings.
These rioters should be treated the exact same way as Ashli Babbit
https://twitter.com/DanielAlmanPGH/status/1746507098467299684
Liberals are total hypocrites when it comes to illegal immigration
By Daniel Alman (aka Dan from Squirrel Hill)
October 5, 2023
Check out these three recent news articles and videos:
Associated Press: “Biden administration waives 26 federal laws to allow border wall construction in South Texas”
Source: https://www.yahoo.com/news/biden-administration-waives-26-federal-224723792.html
New York City Mayor Adams sounds exactly like Trump when he talks about illegal immigrants:
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLHRgAdQwqg
Chicago citizens who voted for Mayor Johnson are angry at him because he kept his campaign promise to be kind to illegal immigrants:
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRrdS6AvGrM
All of these Democrats who are now complaining were perfectly happy with illegal immigration when it overwhelmed the small border towns in Texas. But now that it’s coming to the big blue cities, they have decided that their own “sanctuary city” policy is a bad idea. I absolutely hate this kind of hypocrisy. Either you’re in favor of illegal immigration, or you’re against it. You can’t have it both ways.
It’s also hypocritical how liberals called Trump racist when he talked about illegal immigrants, but now liberals are saying the exact same thing that Trump said. And they’re even building the same border wall which they said was “racist” when Trump wanted to build it.
My only criticism in all of this is their hypocrisy. To me, this has nothing to do with illegal immigration, and everything to do with the fact that these liberals are not willing to live under the same conditions that they were willing to force on to the red state of Texas. I hate, hate, hate their hypocrisy.
95-year-old veteran kicked out of nursing home to make way for migrant housing, lawmakers say
https://www.yahoo.com/news/95-old-veteran-kicked-nursing-205910143.html
95-year-old veteran kicked out of nursing home to make way for migrant housing, lawmakers say
By Elizabeth Elkind
September 26, 2023
A 95-year-old Korean War veteran said he was given less than two months’ notice to figure out where he was going to live after the nursing home he resided in was sold to become a facility for undocumented migrants.
Veteran Frank Tammaro joined Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., a vocal critic of New York City’s handling of the migrant crisis, at a press conference on Monday to discuss the reported deal.
“The thing I’m annoyed about is how they did it, it was very disgraceful what they did to the people in Island Shores,” Tammaro said, referencing the assisted living facility he was in.
He said that Island Shores “gave us time to get out,” but not enough time to protest the decision to boot residents – which Tammaro said he tried to do.
“Then one day there was a notice on the board. I think that gave us a month and a half to find out where we were going to go,” he said. “I thought my suitcases were going to be on the curb because I’m not that fast.”
“If it wasn’t for my daughter, they would’ve been on the curb. That was it. I said, ‘No, no, no, no, you’re not moving me,’ and they said, ‘Yes, yes, yes we are.’ Everything was done behind closed doors – we didn’t have a chance to actually make any attempt to stop them because there wasn’t enough time.”
New York City Councilman David Carr confirmed to local outlet SI Live that he was informed by the city’s Department of Social Services that the migrant facility would open there this week. Fox News Digital reached out to the Department of Social Services for confirmation but did not immediately hear back on Tuesday.
Fox News Digital’s attempt to contact a number associated with Island Shores Senior Residence could not be completed. The facility is listed as “permanently closed” online.
Malliotakis said the reported deal was “showing our country and our city’s priorities are backwards.”
“My blood pressure went through the roof when I found out Homes for the Homeless cut a deal with the City of New York to turn Island Shores into a migrant shelter,” the GOP lawmaker said.
“Our tax dollars as citizens of New York should not be utilized to house citizens of other countries, especially at the expense of our senior citizens and veterans who put their lives on the line, paid taxes their whole lives and built our communities.”
Tens of thousands of migrants have come to New York City over the last year, buckling the city’s infrastructure and overwhelming housing officials.
A judge sided with Staten Island lawmakers on Tuesday in ruling that a migrant facility in the borough, converted from a former Catholic school, should close.
Judge pumps the brakes on Hunter Biden’s guilty plea
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/07/26/hunter-biden-plea-deal/
Judge pumps the brakes on Hunter Biden’s guilty plea
Expected guilty plea by the president’s son is in jeopardy because of concerns about a novel provision in the deal
By Perry Stein, Karl Baker, Devlin Barrett, and Matt Viser
July 26, 2023
WILMINGTON, Del. — A federal judge on Wednesday delayed accepting a guilty plea from President Biden’s son Hunter, saying the terms of the deal may not be constitutional but could be salvaged in the coming weeks if prosecutors and defense lawyers can show her it is on solid legal footing.
The deal that had been struck in June began to unravel near the start of the three-hour hearing, which the White House and allies of the Biden family had hoped would help close a painful chapter in Hunter Biden’s life that has cast a pall over the First Family.
U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika asked questions that revealed the extent of a long-standing dispute between federal prosecutors and Biden’s lawyers over whether the agreement — in which he would plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors and probably avoid jail time — would protect him from the possibility of additional criminal charges. She later questioned the structure of the deal itself, saying lawyers had crafted a two-step plea deal in which some key features may not be reviewable or enforceable by the court.
The complications marked another twist in a case that has been dogged by questions about possible political bias, prosecutorial delay, and debate over whether Hunter Biden was being treated too harshly or too gently because of who his father is. The judge’s skepticism also thrust Biden back into the spotlight, renewing questions over what investigations may be ongoing and how that might affect his father ahead of a presidential reelection campaign, and reanimated congressional Republicans, who have spent months focusing on the Biden family in what have often been fruitless pursuits.
Prosecutors had proposed that Hunter Biden plead guilty to the tax charges in a fairly standard agreement that requires the judge’s approval. Separately, they crafted a “diversion agreement” with Biden’s attorneys in which the president’s son would admit to wrongdoing in a gun case and agree to certain conditions, including not purchasing a firearm and not using drugs, to avoid actually being charged with unlawful possession of a firearm.
That type of agreement is not typically approved by a judge. But this diversion agreement referenced the proposed plea, and prosecutors submitted it to Noreika, creating a bifurcated deal in which the assurances Biden wanted — that he will not be pursued for other tax or foreign lobbying charges — were not part of the tax case, but part of the gun diversion agreement, lawyers said in court.
A provision of the gun diversion agreement said that if Biden, a recovering addict, failed to remain drug-free and meet other conditions for the next two years, Noreika would determine whether he had broken the terms of the deal and tell prosecutors they could revive the gun charge against him.
Biden’s attorney argued the case had been politicized and hinted that such language could protect him if a biased prosecutor unfairly accused Biden of breaching the agreement at some point. The judge said she understood that reasoning but added that if the agreement is unconstitutional, prosecutors could just try to void it and charge Biden anyway.
Noreika also questioned whether she could lawfully make the kind of determination spelled out in the documents, given that she is not a party to the diversion agreement and that judges generally are not responsible for pursuing criminal charges.
“I have concerns about the constitutionality of this provision, so I have concerns about the constitutionality of this agreement,” she said in court.
The judge also asked prosecutors if there was any precedent for a provision constructed this way. No, the prosecutor replied.
At one point, appearing exasperated, she said the lawyers seemed to expect her to simply “rubber-stamp” the agreement they had struck.
She told the two sides to work on the issue, a process that could take weeks.
In the meantime, as the unresolved situation means the criminal charges laid out in the proposed plea deal are still active against Biden, he entered a not guilty plea — for now.
The disagreement over immunity that surfaced at the start of the hearing had been publicly known since the deal was struck: Biden’s attorney said it would resolve the investigation of his client, and David Weiss, the U.S. attorney in Delaware, said the probe was ongoing.
In court, Biden said he was prepared to plead guilty. But then Noreika asked whether he would still do so if it was possible additional charges might be filed against him in the future.
Biden answered no.
Prosecutors again described the federal investigation around Biden as ongoing but, when pressed by the judge, would not reveal any details.
“As far as I’m concerned, the plea agreement is null and void,” Biden lawyer Chris Clark told the judge at one point.
A quick side discussion between the prosecutors and defense lawyers didn’t help.
“I don’t know what you’re trying to accomplish by blowing this up,” Clark told prosecutors. One of those prosecutors, Leo Wise, pointed to papers related to the case and said he was bound by the terms in them.
Clark shot back: “Then we misunderstood; we’re ripping it up.”
Later in the day, the two sides appeared to agree that the deal would provide immunity for certain tax, drug and gun charges between 2014 and 2019.
Wearing a dark suit, Hunter Biden responded, “Yes, your honor,” to questions that ensured he understood the details of what he would be agreeing to and the wrongdoing at the crux of the case. He detailed to the judge his history of drug abuse, saying that he has received inpatient drug and alcohol addiction treatment at least six times since 2003 and that his addiction ruined his business relationships.
The federal investigation of his business dealings was opened in 2018, during the Trump administration, and has been a favorite talking point for Republican critics of the current president and his family. Republican politicians have repeatedly accused Hunter Biden of broad wrongdoing in his overseas business deals and, since his father was elected, predicted that the Biden administration would be reluctant to pursue the case.
Attorney General Merrick Garland has insisted politics would not interfere with the criminal investigation, noting that it was being led by Weiss, a holdover from the Trump administration, and that Weiss had complete discretion over whether to bring charges.
Those assurances have come under intense scrutiny in recent weeks, however, since Republican lawmakers released interview transcripts from two whistleblowers from the Internal Revenue Service who were part of the investigation. They told the House Ways and Means Committee that the Justice Department slowed and stymied the probe, whittling away the most serious evidence of alleged tax crimes. And they alleged that Weiss had told the investigative team his charging options were limited.
Officials said Monday that Weiss, who has pushed back against the whistleblower allegations, is willing to testify to Congress about the investigation in the fall.
Papers filed in court when the plea agreement was reached indicate that Hunter Biden had agreed to plead guilty to two misdemeanor tax charges of failure to pay in 2017 and 2018. A court document says that in both those years, Biden was a resident of D.C., received taxable income of more than $1.5 million and owed more than $100,000 in income tax that he did not pay on time.
Prosecutors planned to recommend a sentence of probation for those counts, according to people familiar with the negotiations who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe elements of the case that are not yet public. Hunter Biden’s representatives have previously said that he eventually paid the IRS what he owed.
A second court filing is about the charge of illegally possessing a weapon, which involves a handgun Biden purchased at a time when he was abusing drugs. In that case, the letter says, “the defendant has agreed to enter a Pretrial Diversion Agreement with respect to the firearm information.”
Diversion is an option typically applied to nonviolent offenders with substance abuse problems. Hunter Biden has written and spoken openly about being addicted to cocaine during the years in question. People close to him, speaking on the condition of anonymity to be candid about a sensitive issue, said he was looking at the potential conclusion of the criminal case against him through the lens of an addict and was hoping to use the guilty plea to admit to past mistakes, make amends and move on.
But even if the legal turmoil that has surrounded Hunter Biden for years is wrapped up in coming days or weeks, the political battle will continue in the form of congressional investigations, attacks via social media and attempts to shape public opinion as the president seeks reelection in 2024.
The whistleblower testimony brought forth new allegations, including a text message that Hunter Biden allegedly sent on July 30, 2017, that invoked his father — at that time a former vice president — as the younger Biden tried to get a business partner to fulfill some expected promise.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, speaking at the start of a White House briefing on Wednesday that began just as proceedings were concluding in Wilmington, attempted to keep a distance from the case.
“Hunter Biden is a private citizen and this was a personal matter for him,” she said. “As we have said, the president, the first lady, they love their son and they support him as he continues to rebuild his life.”
She emphasized that “this case was handled independently, as all of you know, by the Justice Department under the leadership of a prosecutor appointed by the former president, President Trump.”
President Biden, who generally tries to refrain from commenting on his son’s criminal case but has also repeatedly stated that Hunter “did nothing wrong,” had no public events Wednesday and offered no public reaction to the new developments.
The court appearance took place a few miles from where Hunter Biden grew up and went to high school — just blocks from the Joseph R. Biden Jr. Railroad Station, the station from which his father commuted to Washington for decades as a member of Congress.
Giuliani, Researchers Ask Judge To Reject Hunter Biden Plea Deal, Saying Laptop Proves Hundreds Of Crimes
Giuliani, Researchers Ask Judge To Reject Hunter Biden Plea Deal, Saying Laptop Proves Hundreds Of Crimes
By Luke Rosiak
July 24, 2023
A nonprofit research group which combed through Hunter Biden’s laptop has sent a letter to the judge overseeing the First Son’s tax fraud case, urging her to reject the plea deal offered by prosecutors.
Marco Polo, which put emails from the laptop online and wrote a 630-page report summarizing its contents, said that judges are not obligated to accept plea deals even if prosecutors and the defendant agree on them, and that “not only will the plea deal in front of you, if accepted, make a mockery of the phrase ‘slap on the wrist,’ but it will also send a sobering message to citizens which demonstrates that nepotism and proximity to political power determines outcomes in our criminal justice system.”
It said “there is evidence for, at the very least, 459 violations of state and federal laws and regulations on the device. The breakdown is as follows: 140 business-related crimes, 191 sex-related crimes, and, lastly, 128 drug-related crimes. These instances of criminal wrongdoing are supported by primary source evidence: emails, photos, videos, text messages, audio files, et al. The plea deal for your consideration is so meager that the phrase ‘limited hangout’ does not describe the situation.”
It said a “limited hangout” is a public relations technique in which someone who wants to cover up something major admits to a very small portion in order to claim that the issue has been put to rest.
Joining Marco Polo in the letter was Rudy Giuliani, the former Donald Trump attorney who played a role in disseminating the laptop after the FBI appeared to sit on it.
By virtue of having been the United States Attorney (‘USA’) for the Southern District of New York, Mr. Giuliani is uniquely capable of spotting a ‘sweetheart’ deal reserved for those such as Biden, whose father is the president. Without Biden’s familial connections, there is no way any USA or AUSA would have proposed two misdemeanors and essentially a non-prosecution on the felony gun charge,” the letter said.
Robert Costello, Giuliani’s own lawyer and a former deputy in the New York prosecutor’s office, also signed the letter to Judge Maryellen Noreika of the District of Delaware federal court.
The letter said that congressional oversight and whistleblower disclosures have provided information that suggests that the plea deal, which is limited to misdemeanor tax charges, would allow a felony gun charge to go away under a diversion program, and carries a penalty of only probation, was the result of prosecutorial misconduct.
It said that then-Assistant US Attorney Lesley Wolf prevented investigators from getting more evidence by tipping the Bidens off that a raid on a storage unit was imminement.
“This egregious leak from Wolf-and her Department of Justice colleague and lawyer, Mark Daly-infuriated the IRS investigators (i.e. two of the whistleblowers) and likely violated Pennsylvania Bar rules (where Wolf is barred) in addition to federal statutes. Furthermore, Wolf apparently concealed evidence from the investigators, demanded that investigators avoid inquiring about ‘the big guy,’ a moniker for the U.S. president, Joe Biden, and was improperly concerned about the ‘optics’ regarding a search warrant of the U.S. President’s guest house. Suffice it is to say that ‘optics’ should not dictate investigative steps.”
It said according to congressional testimony from IRS whistleblowers, Hunter Biden’s lawyer Chris Clark told prosecutors that their “careers would be ruined if they brought various charges against Hunter.”
Further, “the District of Delaware has never — going back to 1995 — charged 26 USC §7203 as a standalone misdemeanor, as is the case with Biden. This proposed plea deal is, quite literally, unprecedented; we hope you will recognize that it is unprecedented because it is unjust,” the letter said.
“Lastly, the Chairman of the Oversight and Accountability Committee in the U.S. House of Representatives has announced that Biden’s former business partner, Devon Archer, will be testifying before his Committee early next week. It is imperative that this Court be apprised of that testimony to consider whether to accept this plea offer. At the very least, Your Honor’s consideration of this proposed plea should not be made until you are aware of all the salient facts likely to be revealed,” it said.
Collin Rugg: “I’m not saying Hunter Biden snorted cocaine at the White House but if he did, I would expect it to look exactly like this.”
https://twitter.com/CollinRugg/status/1676697464118681601
Collin Rugg: “I’m not saying Hunter Biden snorted cocaine at the White House but if he did, I would expect it to look exactly like this.”
Dan from Squirrel Hill's Blog 