Category Archives: Federalist

The George Floyd Justice In Policing Act passed the House Wednesday evening 220-212 and will now head to the Senate. While two representatives, Jared Golden of Maine and Ron Kind of Wisconsin, were the only Democrats to vote against the measure, Republican Rep. Lance Gooden of Texas pressed the wrong button and voted yes accidentally.

I accidentally pressed the wrong voting button and realized it too late, Gooden tweeted but deleted it soon after. I have changed the official record to reflect my opposition to the partisan George Floyd Policing Act.

I have arguably the most conservative/America First voting record in Congress! Of course I wouldnt support the radical lefts Anti-Police Act. I have changed the official record to reflect my opposition, Gooden clarified.

The House vote was previously scheduled for Thursday but was moved to Wednesday because of alleged Capitol security threats. The so-called Justice in Policing Act, introduced by Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., is being touted by the Biden administration as necessary to solve systemic misconduct and systemic racism in police departments.

To make our communities safer, we must begin by rebuilding trust between law enforcement and the people they are entrusted to serve and protect. We cannot rebuild that trust if we do not hold police officers accountable for abuses of power and tackle systemic misconduct and systemic racism in police departments, the White House said in a statement.

Section 311 of the act identifies that officers who pull over certain identity groups, such as more black men than black women, will be defined as a prima facie evidence violation. If men are found to speed at higher rates than women in a given region, for example, a police department would technically be in violation of the act. The Justice in Policing Act also calls for racial quotas for traffic stops, pedestrian stops, and interviews. In essence, departments would be forced to deal with all people equitably, which would fundamentally contradict the notion of equal justice in a free and fair society.

The Justice in Policing Act is unlikely to pass through the Senate, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi acknowledged a week ago.

What the Senate will do is what the Senate will do, but we will send over the bill that has the balance that we have in it, Pelosi told reporters.

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The Sole Republican To Vote In Favor Of The George Floyd Bill Did So Accidentally - The Federalist

The Nasdaq stock exchange amended its diversity plan on Dec. 1 and filed a proposal with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to mandate all companies maintain at least two board members from diverse backgrounds.

Nasdaq recently submitted a proposal to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission focused on diversity of the boards of companies listed on our U.S. exchange, wrote the President and CEO of Nasdaq Adena T. Friedman in the Wall Street Journal on Monday. Our proposal establishes a recommended objective for companies to include at least two board members from diverse backgrounds. We asked that each company disclose anonymous aggregate data self-disclosed by the directors regarding their gender identity, race, ethnicity and sexual orientation.

If passed by the SEC, any Nasdaq-listed companies that do not comply with the new rules will have to provide an explanation to all shareholders. The plan requires that there is a self-identified female on each company board, as well as someone who self-identifies as either an underrepresented minority or LGBTQ+, according to a statement released by Nasdaq in December.

This proposal and partnership gives companies an opportunity to make progress toward increasing representation of women, underrepresented minorities, and the LGBTQ+ community on their boards, Nelson Griggs, president of Nasdaq stock exchange, said.

While Friedman claims this new proposition is not a quota, it is unclear how forcing companies to adopt racist affirmative action measures, or else risk notifying their respective boards, is not a hard-line stance against meritocracy.

In February, McDonalds announced plans to implement diversity hiring quotas, with the aim of having a so-called equitable representation of men and women employees by the year 2030.

As a world-leading brand that considers inclusion one of our core values, we will accept nothing less than real, measurable progress in our efforts to lead with empathy, treat people with dignity and respect, and seek out diverse points of view to drive better decision-making, President and CEO Chris Kempczinski of McDonalds wrote in a LinkedIn article. Today, I would like to share two goals we have set as we continue to build the strong foundation we need to fully realize our ambition.

Similarly, lawmakers in California approved a bill in August of 2020 mandating that all companies based in the state maintain at least one underrepresented minority board member, and three by 2022 for boards large enough.

Overall, our proposal seeks to demonstrate that, with proper disclosure and clear objectives, companies and investors can create momentum toward an approach to capitalism that offers more opportunity to more people. We believe this can be accomplished through a market-driven solution rather than government intervention, Friedman said.

Across the country, institutions are aiming to destroy the notion of equality for equity. In a tweet right before the November presidential election, now-Vice President Kamala Harris tweeted a video discussing the differentiation of the two, admitting that equity denotes not equal opportunity, but rather equal outcome: a tenet of communism.

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If Nasdaq Gets Its Way, Companies Must Have Two 'Diverse' Board Members - The Federalist

Another left-wing fact-checking organization targeted a Federalist article focused on green energys inability to hold up during the Texas winter storm last week on Facebook.

Independent fact-checkers say this information is missing context and could mislead people, Facebook factchecker Lead Stories label reads.

The fact check from Gov. Andrew Cuomo-defending organization PolitiFact claims that natural gas plants were the biggest cause of the power shortfall, not wind. The author, however, does acknowledge that wind farms ran at about half of what was expected, which contributed to the widespread blackouts, a similar point to the article by Federalist contributor Jason Isaac and the Wall Street Journal.

In The Federalist, Isaac argued that green energy showcased its fundamental unreliability and impracticality during the storm. He says the energy catastrophe that left millions without electricity for days in subzero temperatures is partly due to the lavish suite of government incentives given to green energy initiatives, which have repeatedly failed to keep up with Texass electricity demand and dont provide reliable energy amid unfavorable weather. It is possible both for this to be true and for other sources of energy such as natural gas to have failed in Texas, which is what happened.

The Wall Street Journals deep dive into the Texas power grid failures noted that wind power in Texas supplies about 25% of the states electricity so when half of that capacity shut down when ice coated the turbine bladesdemand surged and the agency that manages the states power grid, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, imposed rolling blackouts.

Ercot ordered the electricity providers to shed as much as 14 gigawatts, enough to serve about 2.8 million households, the article stated. The grid operator said that about 46 gigawatts of natural gas, coal, and wind generation wasnt workingroughly 40% of what it had expected to be available.

In other words, when demand for energy goes up and 40 percent of the total supply malfunctions, in significant part because solar energy doesnt work in the dark or when wind turbines are iced stiff, you get blackouts.

Earlier this week, Lead Stories, an organization that relies on funding from Silicon Valley tech giants Google and Facebook and Chinese-operated ByteDance to censor posts, added a false information label to the article. The fact-check did not address The Federalist articles argument directly but merely focused on criticizing a Facebook postearlier this week from a user who noted the green energy sectors failures during the Texas power crisis.

Jordan Davidson is a staff writer at The Federalist. She graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism.

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Facebook Targets The Federalist With Myopic 'Fact Check' On Energy - The Federalist

After wielding fabricated evidence at the recent Senate impeachment trial, Democrats plan to call a conspiracy-obsessed MSNBC Russia-hoaxer who once encouraged ISIS to bomb a Trump Tower to testify in Wednesdays hearing on domestic terrorism.

Malcolm Nance, a left-wing Navy veteran accused of exaggerating his military accomplishments while in the service, will join lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee to discuss the Capitol riots in early January.

This is my nominee for first ISIS suicide bombing of a Trump property, Nance wrote in 2017 in a since-deleted tweet with a picture of Trump Tower Istanbul, building credibility among Democrats to offer congressional testimony on domestic terrorism.

Identified as an intelligence expert by MSNBC, where he works as a contributor, Nance became one the most vocal pundits perpetuating the never-ending Russia hoax to smear President Donald Trump, along with any and all political opponents, as Kremlin assets. In August 2016, Nance flat-out lied on TV, claiming Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein has a show on Russia Today. MSNBCs Joy Reid failed to correct him.

Worse, as independent journalist Glenn Greenwald pointed out in The Intercept in 2018, two years later the network still refused to ever offer a correction, allowing its viewers to believe Stein hosted her own program on the Russian outlet.

In The New Yorker, Nance took aim at Greenwald in 2019, falsely identifying the co-founder of the Intercept as a Fox News contributor while still claiming Trump is a subservient asset of the Russian government. The interview took place even after the release of the Mueller report debunking the Democrats four-year Russia conspiracy.

When pressed on his claims contradicting what had been outlined in the Mueller report just several months prior, Nance merely responded, Thats why it is called analysis. He went on to cite several books written on the topic entirely refuted by the more than two-year special counsel investigation run with unlimited resources.

Wednesday will mark day two of congressional hearings in the aftermath of the riots at the Capitol building last month. Capitol police testified before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Tuesday, blaming security failures on the day of the attack on other agencies slow to provide additional support.

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NBC Analyst Who Urged ISIS Bomb Trump Tower Will Testify On Terrorism - The Federalist

Democrats went big last week when they unveiled a new immigration reform bill. The U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021, introduced by 12 Democrat lawmakers in the House and Senate, made it clear that President Joe Bidens party is not interested in compromise. But it wont be the details of a bill that is unlikely to pass that most affect the problem of illegal immigration or debates about the issue.

The wholesale amnesty congressional Democrats offered will encourage an already growing surge of people seeking to breach the southern border even if it never passes. Bidens executive orders are effectively ending enforcement of the existing laws and encouraging both illegal immigration and bogus asylum claims by growing numbers of Central Americans. This is already creating a humanitarian crisis at the border and a collapse of the rule of law that could have devastating political consequences for his party.

Democrats proposed changes would fundamentally alter immigration law via an amnesty program that offers all who have broken U.S. immigration law a path to citizenship in eight years. It would also end restrictions on spouses and children joining family members already in the country and greatly expand worker visas vastly expanding the number of foreigners allowed to enter the United States at a time of crushing pandemic-related unemployment.

Just as important, and unlike past efforts at fixing an immigration system that both parties believe is broken, the Democrat package treats border security as a non-issue. In the past, such as the 1986 amnesty bill signed by President Ronald Reagan and the 2013 Gang of Eight bipartisan reform package, both sought, albeit weakly, to curtail future waves of illegal immigration.

In contrast, today Democrats are solely interested in facilitating entry into the country by funding improvements at ports of entry. The bills only nod in the direction of stopping the influx of illegals is a $4 billion aid package to Central American countries that holds out the vain hope that these nations can somehow fix their internal problems and make staying home rather than seeking opportunity in the United States a more attractive option.

That this left-wing wish list hasnt a prayer of becoming law was acknowledged by Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., one of its principal sponsors. He conceded he is unlikely to persuade the 10 Republicans he needs to vote for his bill to defeat a potential filibuster.

But he and others on the left understand that Democrats window of opportunity to pass the lefts wish list on immigration or any other issue may only last until the 2022 midterms, so they might as well not settle for trying to pass more limited bills that will likely be just as difficult to pass.

Yet the effects of this plan go far beyond counting votes. Past offers of amnesty from Washington have always set off a rush at the border of those hoping to take advantage of the prospective change in the laws. This pattern has been repeated since Bidens victory. As The New York Times reported in December, a surge of illegals began, with the number of those trying to gain entry into the country rising to the highest levels since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic.

At the time, Biden sought to lower expectations about any swift changes in immigration and asylum policies once he took office. Although he had pledged to make a clear break with the Trump administrations tough stance, in comments made a few days before Christmas, Biden spoke as if he understood that events were already starting to overtake his desire for a more compassionate approach to the issue. Stating that he was worried about the possibility of having two million people attempting to cross the border and setting off a humanitarian crisis, Biden said encouraging such a surge would be the last thing we need.

But that commendable caution has long since been forgotten. Although White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki has warned those thinking about crossing the border illegally that now is not the time to come, theres now an even better reason for them to ignore her. The message they are hearing after a series of policy shifts on enforcement and asylum admission is a lot louder: Biden is now letting people into the United States and telling those whose job it is to stop and deport them to give up.

In a series of executive orders issued earlier this month, Biden revived the infamous catch and release practice in which those caught at the border are allowed to stay in the country where they will await court proceedings that most ignore.

Hes also ended Trumps policy of forcing those seeking asylum from Central American countries to stay on the other side of the border awaiting hearings. Most of these people are immigrants wanting a better life and claiming that gangs, crime, and poverty have caused them to demand entrance to the United States rather than, as is traditionally the case, having a specific fear of persecution that would justify granting asylum.

These people, whose claims are largely legally unsustainable, are now simply being allowed into the country where they will add to the growing total of illegals (usually estimated at approximately 11 million people but, as a 2018 Yale University study noted may be as much as twice that many due to successful efforts at evading detection) who will be eligible for amnesty under Democrat plans.

Biden has also issued several new regulations that will drastically limit the ability of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to track down illegals who have gone through the legal process and are eligible for deportation. The new rules will prevent those guilty of all but the most grievous of crimes from being arrested.

The list of categories of those given a pass includes those with drunken driving convictions and membership in gangs. Attorneys general from 17 states wrote to protest the decision. It took an intervention from Texas law officials to prevent the release of three child sex offenders who were illegals.

While this result is exactly what the Democrats left-wing base wants, some in the party are worried. As Politico reports, Texas Democrats believe the growing crisis at the border being enabled by Bidens decisions is a recipe for disaster for their party in the Lone Star state. Rep. Vincente Gonzalez, D-Texas, who represents a border district affected by the spike in illegals, said the impending catastrophe will cost the Democrats their House majority in 2022.

Taken as a whole, Bidens measures hamstringing law enforcement, releasing illegals into the country even amid a pandemic, and Democrat plans for wholesale amnesty are understandably encouraging anyone in Central America who wants to come to the United States to try their luck. Americans dont have to wait to see whether the Democrats plan will pass and usher in a new age of open borders. Ending enforcement along with catch and release means amnesty for illegals is already here.

Jonathan S. Tobin is a senior contributor to The Federalist, editor in chief of JNS.org, and a columnist for the New York Post. Follow him on Twitter at @jonathans_tobin.

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Democrats Don't Need Amnesty. Biden Has Already Opened The Borders - The Federalist

On this episode of The Federalist Radio Hour, President of the Ethics and Public Policy Center Ryan T. Anderson joins Culture Editor Emily Jashinsky to discuss Amazons recent attempt to deplatform his book When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment.

When we think about trusts, antitrust law, or monopoly or collusion, its something different here. Its not the historic thing, its more of like an ideological collusion, Anderson explained. I think one thing conservatives are going to have to get over is Its a private business. It can do whatever it wants.

Apparently, Amazon has an 83 percent market share for book sales in the United States, Anderson continued. If you control that much of the market, and then if other big technology companies, social media companies, other book publishers, other platforms, share a similar ideology that always cuts in the same direction, you might want to think that there are limits to economic liberties, there are limits to private property rights, and what should those limits be? We have other laws that we use: Anti-discrimination limits on private business owners, we have anti-monopoly, antitrust limits, we have common carrier and utility limits. I dont think Big Tech is a perfect fit on any of those categories, which just says we need to have a new model.

Shutting down the conversation surrounding certain topics such as transgenderism, Anderson said, is dangerous and only enabled by policies such as the Democrat-proposed Equality Act.

Its an abuse of our civil rights law when we add all these different protected classes and when we treat reasonable disagreements as if theyre discriminatory, Anderson concluded. Weve done it on the gay marriage debate; were now doing it on the transgender debate. And the Equality Act would just make this worse.

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Conservative Author Whose Book Was Banned By Amazon Talks Digital Book-Burning - The Federalist

Twitter appears to be blocking the website for the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) Wednesday as the annual congregation of grassroots conservatives kicks off in several hours.

Instead of going directly to the website when users click on CPAC.org, Twitter redirects the user to a warning page that it might be unsafe.

The link you are trying to access has been identified by Twitter or our partners as being potentially spammy or unsafe, the page reads.

A spokesperson for Twitter told The Federalist the link to the CPAC website was marked unsafe in error and has now been reversed.

The American Conservative Union, which operates CPAC, also did not immediately respond to The Federalists inquiry.

Twitters restrictions of the website for the flagship conservative conference, routinely the largest gathering of grassroots activists in the country, marks the continuation of progressive censorship from the nations Silicon Valley tech giants. Episodes of online censorship have only escalated following the January Capitol riot, exploited by the left, along with the inauguration of a new president.

Just in the last month, Twitter has censored a Christian ministry for claiming boys and girls are different, Project Veritas founder James OKeefe for his investigative journalism, and anti-Big Tech activist Mike Davis for demanding prosecution of those who engage in domestic terrorism.

The American Conservative Unions signature conference routinely draws the biggest names in the conservative movement each year, with 2021 being no exception. Former President Donald Trump is expected to speak on Sunday at the conference held this year in Orlando, Florida.

The theme of this years conference is left-wing cancel culture.

This article has been updated since publication.

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Twitter Blocked Links To CPAC's Website. Claims It Was Just An 'Error' - The Federalist

On this episode of The Federalist Radio Hour, writer and producer at Sinclair and Federalist Senior Contributor Ellie Bufkin joins Culture Editor Emily Jashinsky to celebrate the 30-year anniversary of the iconic thriller movie Silence of the Lambs and discuss how the film demonstrates the evolution of Hollywood.

One of the things I like, you know, obviously movies based on a novel or multiple novels, but the story itself, the way that it translated onto screen, was almost pitch-perfect, Bufkin explained. Its difficult to put a story with as much detail as these novels had on camera, and to be able to make it as interesting and as terrifying as a reader would have been going through with that story, they did such an incredible job. And thats complicated. I think thats probably the most difficult to screen is like actually keeping the complexity of the characters.

When critics label the film as anti-trans and attempt to view it through a current lens instead of seeing it as 30 years old, Bufkin said, it is harmful to the films reputation.

I think that the idea that we cant trust viewers to make their own decisions about what is moral and what is good is a real shame. And I think that as soon as you start, you know, putting, whatever moral high ground you think, you are in front of every single piece of art that has been made, is being made, or will be made in the future. You really lose the ability to make anything of quality, and you suck the soul out of things that have already been made.

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'Silence Of The Lambs' At 30: How Would It Be Different Today? - The Federalist

In the film Wag The Dog, Robert De Niro plays a political fixer who produces a fake war to save a president from a scandal. In one seminal scene, William H. Macy plays a CIA operative who tells De Niros character that there is no war. But the fixer has an answer; he says of course there is a war, because he is watching it on TV. We find ourselves in a similar place on the supposed Republican civil war in the wake of the non-leftist Capitol riot.

Lets be perfectly clear: there is no civil war in the GOP, no major schism, no two sides battling for control of the party of Lincoln. Poll after poll shows us that Republican voters overwhelmingly see Donald Trump as the leader of the party. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Rep. Liz Cheneys hopes that voters would abandon Trump have been dashed on the cliffs of reality.

So why is the media pretending that some major battle for the future of the GOP has been joined? One reason is quite simply the desire to keep the profitable Trump story going. After spending five years addicted to easy bait and click stories, the media is loathe to give Trump up. Stories of him, Machiavelli-like, plotting and planning in the glam quarters of Mar a Lago are too tempting to resist.

The right sort have been mocking Republicans like House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Sen. Lindsay Graham for heading to Florida to kiss Trumps ring. But why wouldnt they? Trumps populist, America First presidency was wildly popular among conservatives. His willingness to be the first Republican to fully engage the culture war also gave a new meaning and purpose for the party even in defeat.

Lets look at what each side is offering and compare. The Trump wing, otherwise known as 90 percent of the GOP, is offering a laser focus on American jobs, a firm hand at the border, and a foreign policy that doesnt kowtow to China and avoids new wars. Culturally it s a party willing to say that men cannot become women and that America is not a racist country.

The establishment side is offering what, exactly? Calm? Dignity? I dont know, judges? Judges are great, and they are McConnells legacy. But by the time political and cultural issues go before the courts, conservatives have already lost; they are already on defense. What is McConnells vision for the Republican Party? What is Cheneys? What do they want to achieve? Does anyone know?

As conservatives look at the country right now they see schools teaching their kids that America is bad place. They see corporations embracing racism that is eroding the very notion of a society of equals. They see big tech censoring not just opinions but actual news that could hinder the leftist march towards total power.

In short, conservative voters see an existential crisis. Its a real one, not the political theater of troops and fences in Washington DC awaiting an insurrection that isnt coming, but the fraying of the basic fabric of America. Voters dont want to hear McConnells complaints about Trumps behavior. They want to hear how a Republican Party that has been playing defense for 30 years will take the fight forward to restore basic American values.

For those in the media, and former conservatives left homeless by Trumps success, the myth of this civil war is too much to resist. They are desperate to believe that any moment now GOP voters will come to their senses and reject Trump. It isnt going to happen. They warn that losses in the suburban white vote will doom Republicans to permanent second place, but as the party becomes more diverse and working class it can afford to leave the Whole Foods set behind.

The Republican Party is Donald Trumps party. It is today and it will be tomorrow. As the out of touch media drones on about establishment fossils trying to turn the clock back, rest assured they have no idea what they are talking about it. There is no civil war; its just a TV show. And we already know how it ends.

David Marcus is the Federalist's New York Correspondent. Follow him on Twitter, @BlueBoxDave.

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There Is No GOP Civil War - The Federalist

White House press secretary Jen Psaki admitted that most of the federal funds designated for schools and other educational institutions in the Biden administrations COVID-19 bill will not be spent in 2021.

During a press briefing on Monday, one reporter pressed Psaki on how the money set aside for education in the American Rescue Plan would be used to help reopen schools.

A CBO analysis suggested that only a small portion of the $130 billion for schools would actually be spent in the current fiscal year. What exactly is the White House doing to ensure that money would actually mean that schools could potentially open to March and April before the academic year ends? the reporter asked.

Psaki, however, was unbothered with the fact that much of the money in the bill would be left unspent on a return to in-person learning. Instead, the press secretary argued that those funds would be better used to ensure that schools could pay teachers, reinforcing the Biden administrations affection for prioritizing teachers and teachers unions over students learning interests.

A big part of the challenge here for a number of schools is that they need, in order to operate responsibly and given the threat of budget cuts, they need to obligate funds according to spending plans, rather than exhausting all balances as soon as theyre received, she explained. So the challenge here is, how do they plan ahead? They can hire, if they need to hire additional teachers now for smaller class sizes or if they need to hire bus drivers or if they need to hire, they need to do improvements to their facilities, they want to be able to know, understandably, just like any business or company, that they will be able to employ teachers next year and the year ahead, so thats why this funding is so essential is because they need to be able to plan ahead so that they can make the improvements now and do the hiring now.

Psakis comments come after nearly $1 trillion of Congresss previous coronavirus spending funds are still sitting unused. One $100 million authorization in the CARES Act, which granted federally funded schools resources for cleaning and disinfecting as well as assistance in counseling and distance learning, was also left untouched as schools around the United States kept their doors closed in exchange for virtual learning.

Jordan Davidson is a staff writer at The Federalist. She graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism.

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Psaki Admits School COVID Funds Are To Pay Teachers, Not Get Kids In Classrooms - The Federalist