Category Archives: Federalist

Recently released handwritten notes from a briefing of the acting attorney general on the status of Crossfire Hurricane reveal the FBI either lied about the source of intel or the British intelligence community fed information to the U.S. agents investigating Donald Trump and his associates.

As part of the pre-trial discovery in the governments prosecution of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann, the special counsel provided defense lawyers notes taken on March 6, 2017, during a high-level briefing of acting Attorney General Dana Boente about the then-ongoing investigation into supposed Russia collusion.

Boente, who held oversight of the DOJ and FBI related to the Crossfire Hurricane investigation because of then-Attorney General Jeff Sessionss recusal, received an update during the meeting from the FBIs then-Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, then-assistant director of the FBI Counterintelligence Division Bill Priestap, and Counterintelligence Deputy Assistant Director Peter Strzok. DOJ officials Tashina Gauhar, Mary McCord, and Scott Schools took notes during the briefing, and those notes became public during the Sussmann trial that ended in an acquittal last week.

Soon after the release of the notes, Hans Mahncke and Stephen McIntyre detailedfor The Federalist, several passages that indicated the FBI had lied to the DOJ during the March 6, 2017 meeting in numerous ways. From the cryptic notes, Mahncke and McIntyre deciphered and exposed several significant false storylines sold to the acting attorney general, making their article a must-read.

While any lies, misrepresentations, or material omissions matteror should, especially when told to the acting attorney general related to an investigation connected to the president of the United States, the notes references to CROWN reporting prove particularly significant because of the FISA courts insistence that the DOJ included Christopher Steeles background as an MI6 agent in the FISA application prior to the secret surveillance court issuing an order to surveil Carter Page.

The phrase CROWN Reporting appeared multiple times in one set of handwritten notes taken during McCabe, Priestap, and Strzoks March 6, 2017, FBI briefing of the DOJ and Acting Attorney General Boente. Next to CROWN Reporting, the notes referenced convention, Crimea and NATO and soften stance for exchange of Russian energy stocks. These notations fell under the header of points related to Manafort.

A second reference to CROWN source reporting came during the FBIs briefing of Boente concerning the investigation of Carter Page, with the notation following the general discussion of Page.

The notes do not elaborate on the CROWN source or who provided the CROWN source reporting. There are two possibilities, both of which have huge implications for the ongoing special counsel investigation.

First, the claimed CROWN source could be former MI6 spy Steele. To date, Steele remains the only person with a connection to British intelligence publicly known to have provided the FBI with information related to Trump and individuals connected to Trump during the Russia collusion investigation.

But if by CROWN source the FBI meant Steele, the individual briefing Boente lied to him in several ways, did so in a material way, and there is likely a paper trail that can confirm an earlier, similar lie by FBI agents.

While Steele had at one time served in the British intelligence service, his MI6 status ended long ago, when he retired in 2009 to start the private intelligence service Orbis Business Intelligence. Further, as the Department of Justice Office of Inspector General (OIG) reported more than two years ago, Steele told the OIG that the source network he used to compile the memoranda, referred to colloquially as the Steele dossier, did not involve sources from his time as an MI6 agent. On the contrary, his sources were developed entirely in the period after he retired from government service.

So not only was Steele not a CROWN source, his supposed intel also lacked any connection to Crown Source Reporting. Accordingly, unless the FBI had a still publicly unknown CROWN source who provided the information on which agents briefed the DOJ during the March 6, 2017 meeting, they lied to the DOJ.

Falsely attributing intel to a CROWN source proves significant, and not merely for Boentes oversight of Crossfire Hurricane, but also for Boentes decision to approve the third application to surveil Page under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). And the DOJs representation of a connection between Steele and British intelligence in the FISA applications appeared dispositive to the FISA courts decision to authorize surveillance of Page.

Two little-noticed passages, separated by some 50 pages in the OIGs 478-page report on FISA abuse, revealed the importance the FISA court put on Steeles connection to British intelligence in ordering surveillance of Page. According to the OIG, before filing its official FISA application, the DOJ submitted a read copy to the FISA court to obtain feedback from the FISA courts legal advisor on whether the application met the statutory requirements and on any issues of concern raised by the legal advisor or the FISA judge handling the application.

In the first read copy submitted to the FISA court related to Page, the application contained a description of the source network that included the fact that Steele relied upon a Primary Sub-source who used a network of sub-sources, and that neither Steele nor the Primary Sub-source had direct access to the information being reported. The draft application also contained a separate footnote on each sub-source with a brief description of his/her position or access to the information he/she was reporting.

After reviewing the read copy, the FISA courts legal advisor asked how it was that Steele had a network of sub-sources. In response, the governments Office of Intelligence (OI) attorney provided additional information to him regarding Steeles past employment history.

The FISA courts legal advisor then requested that additional information be included in the final application, resulting in the final version of the October 2016 FISA application including a footnote detailing Steeles prior work for British intelligence. The FISA court granted the revised FISA application, ordering surveillance of Page to begin in October 2016. The FISA court renewed the surveillance order three additional times, once in December, again in March, when Boente signed the application, and finally on June 29, 2017, when Acting Attorney General Rod Rosenstein signed the final FISA application.

All of the applications referenced Steeles past service in British intelligence, but, as noted above, Steeles source network was unrelated to his government work and came entirely from his private work. Given that the FISA courts legal advisor questioned how it was that Steele had a network of sub-sources, and that the advisor directed the OI attorney to expressly include Steeles previous work as an MI6 agent in the application, the FISA court clearly believed Steeles network of sources came from his time as a British agent.

Further, given the significance the FISA court placed on that fact, it seems likely the FISA court would have denied the surveillance order had it been told the truththat Steeles network of sources had been privately acquired.

The FBIs representation during the March 6, 2017 meeting that the supposed intel related to Manafort and Page came from CROWN sources,again, assuming the agent meant Steelesuggests the Crossfire Hurricane team deceived the DOJ from the beginning, resulting in the OI attorney representing to the FISA court that Steeles network of sources were sources used by British intelligence. That deception also likely affected Boentes decision to sign the second renewal application.

While these events occurred more than five years ago, and a five-year statute of limitations governs false statement offenses, the D.C. Circuit has held that if a defendant engages in a scheme to falisf[y], conceal[], or cover[]up material facts, the limitations period does not begin to run until the scheme ends.

In this case, then, any FBI agents involved in concealing from the DOJ during the final preparation and review of the June 29, 2017, FISA application that Steeles sources were not CROWN sources or connected to his work in British intelligence could still face criminal liability.

Further, while the Sussmann trial proved memories failsometimes convenientlyuncovering the individuals responsible for representing Steeles source network as connected to his past life as an MI6 agent seems a relatively straightforward venture given what we learned from the special counsels conviction of Kevin Clinesmith.

Clinesmith pleaded guilty nearly two years ago to altering an email related to Page to make it appear that Page was not a source for the CIA. Clinesmiths undoing came from the fact that in preparing the FISA application and renewals, the various government actors used email to confirm details, including with Clinesmith.

The OIG report on FISA abuse detailed that process, noting there were many back-and-forth exchange[s] between the OI Attorney and the FBI, during which the OI Attorney asked many questions about Page, as well as about Steeles reporting and the structure and access of his source network. To further address reliability, the OI Attorney sought information from the FBI to describe the source network in the FISA application, according to the OIG report. And that information-gathering process included email exchanges and written summaries of briefings.

Either that briefing left the OI attorney with the impression that Steeles source network came from his MI6 work, or after the FISA court legal advisor asked, how it was that Steele had a network of sub-sources, the OI attorney pushed the FBI for more information. If the latter, emails likely memorialize the exchanges.

Whether the FBI agents affirmatively misrepresented Steeles source network as connected to his British intelligence work in their communiques with the OI attorney, and in turn the OI attorney relayed that information to the FISA court, is unknown to us, but hopefully not to Special Counsel Durham.

Even if no one lied to the OI attorney and he merely assumed Steeles source network carried over from his time with MI6, a misrepresentation to Boente during the March 6, 2017, briefing that Steele was a CROWN source still matters because the FISA surveillance orders were renewed two more times after that meeting.

That, of course, is assuming the FBI meant Steele when they referenced a CROWN sourcesomething not entirely clear. More on that shortly.

Margot Cleveland is The Federalist's senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prizethe law schools highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.

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Why Handwritten FBI Notes The Special Counsel Just Released Are Huge - The Federalist

A spate of news articles came out in recent days hilariously attempting to do two things for Joe Biden. The first is to paint his dumpster presidency as though hes a victim of circumstance rather than the rotting root of all of our nations woes.

Politicos version on Sunday went like this: President Joe Biden and his aides have grown increasingly frustrated by their inability to turn the tide against a cascade of challenges threatening to overwhelm the administration. The story also declared that, In crisis after crisis, the White House has found itself either limited or helpless in its efforts to combat the forces pummeling them

Similarly, an online article by NBC News last week said Biden is Faced with a worseningpolitical predicament. Biden is not faced with a predicament and there is not a cascade of challenged thats threatening his administration. Biden is the predicament. He is the challenge.

Its not a matter of chance that the southern border continues to be crushed by all of Latin Americas destitute. Its because Biden and his trusty sidekick Kamala Harris allow it. They invite it.

There were 234,000 illegal border crossings in April, the latest month for which government data is available. Thats more than any other month of Bidens presidency. Its 55,000 more than April of the previous year and its more than triple the amount of crossing that took place in the final month of Donald Trumps presidency.

Watching those numbers climb, Bidens team decided it was as good a time as any to lift the Covid rule that allowed for the expedited expulsion of illegal migrants.

Its by no sad stroke of luck that under Biden the cost of gas has doubled and Americans have to take out a second mortgage to buy a week of groceries. Its the $2 trillion in welfare (sometimes referred to as Covid relief) Biden and Congressional Democrats shoved into an economy that was already at a simmer. Steve Rattner, an economist who worked in the Obama administration, when Biden was vice president, said all of that money would go down in history as an extraordinary policy mistake.

This is the case with all of our biggest problems. Biden isnt faced with them. He created them.

The second thing these news articles do is try to make it look like Biden and his aides are aware of the calamity and are in some way productively strategizing the best ways to address it.

Heres how the Washington Post did it on May 31: President Biden [has] complained for weeks to aides that his administration was not doing enough to publicly explain the fastest price increases in roughly four decades. The story referred to new activity, a flurry of activity, and, a flurry of moves by the White House, which amounted to some officials writing op-eds and appearing on TV news programs.

That Politico piece said the plan is now to put Biden on the road to highlight progress being made.

NBC illustrated how deadly earnest Biden is in noting that hes pressing aides for a more compelling message and a sharper strategy, and mentioned that hes bristling at how theyve tried to stifle the plain-speaking persona that has long been one of his most potent assets.

Dont worry, FOLKS. Biden knows just how bad it is out there for you FOLKS. Hes pressing and bristling, FOLKS.

If it werent for the fact that moms arent able to find baby formula in Bidens barren economy, this would be funny. But thats another one of those real problems Biden faces created.

Hang tight. The White House is about to put Biden on the road.

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Joe Biden Is Not A Victim. He Is The Aggressor - The Federalist

Just Tyrus, the new memoir by Fox News commentator Tyrus, details his independent streak that conservatives can learn from, rooted in the commonsense individualism of a biracial, fatherless young man who defeated victimhood and landed high-profile gigs with household brands such as Snoop Dogg and World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE).

William F. Buckleys highbrow, harpsichord-plucking, snobbish, WASPy, country club conservatism is waning. Tyrus rugged, homegrown, free-thinking The Hulk and John Wayne-inspired conservatarianism is rising.

The oldest child of a then-illegal biracial marriage, Tyrus (legally named George Murdoch) tells of horrific domestic violence against him and his white mother by his black father, who attempts to throw a young Tyrus out the window of their cramped, high-rise Boston apartment.

After a California move, a dysfunctional white stepfather bashes out a 13-year-old Tyrus front teeth, inspiring a subsequent vengeance beating by Tyrus, who eventually grew to a dominating 6 feet 8 inches tall and 350 pounds. Beating his stepfather led Tyrus to depart home at age 16, his belongings in a trash bag, sparking years of couch surfing.

During a childhood with no consistent male role models at home, Tyrus felt drawn to masculine, heroic archetypes flashing across TV especially WWE superstars. Social science data suggests Tyrus is an exception: a poor, abused, fatherless child who graduated college and successfully turned his Hollywood fairytales into realities, rather than dropping out of high school or perishing in gangbanging street violence. As rising generations of fatherless, latchkey kids suffer from opioid overdoses and other postmodernism-induced ailments, Tyrus story of triumph is that much more inspiring.

Its painful to read the harrowing obstacles Tyrus faced while suffering from a racist grandfather who couldnt stand his own grandsons skin. He told Tyrus mother she was lucky any white man would have her after she slept with a black man. Tyrus first girlfriend hid him under her bed for five hours after her racist family unexpectedly showed up.

While hes honest about such wrongdoing against him, Tyrus is also honest about his own sins, including using a chair to crush the orbital socket and collarbone of a loving foster mother worried about his soiled playground clothes. Tyrus says that is his biggest life regret. It happened at age 7, and she quickly forgave him. He also details regret about a stint dealing drugs while living in Nebraska pursuing collegiate football.

Tyrus eventually used his daunting physique to land L.A. nightclub bouncer gigs, which turned into bodyguarding for Snoop Dogg. He later details the grueling workouts and mandatory weight loss to fulfill his childhood fantasy of snagging roles in the WWE spotlight.

Its high-concept entertainment built around heroes and villains, he writes, dismissive of those who whine (he doesnt name them, but many establishment pearl-clutching Republicans fit) about WWEs low-brow inauthenticity. The art of simulating combat is revered, especially in Japan. Its considered an art form, in fact. At its heart, thats what professional wrestling is. Not to mention the fact that you have to be in incredible shape to perform at the highest levels that professional wrestling demands.

Tyrus sums up his life: I am or have been a blue-chip, all-American, talented college athlete; a college graduate; a liar, cheater, manipulator; an animal enthusiast; a smart-ass (a personal point of pride); a rude bully; a lost, angry bar cook. Ive been fucked over, hated on, fired, passed over, judged; a target of attempted lynching (but it didnt work out for them); a police brutality survivor; that n-gg-r, a n-gg-r, my n-gg-r [slurs printed in original]. Ive had a gun to my head twice; had my heart broken; had it put back together againbut Ive never been a victim.

Arguably, skepticism of victimhood underpins what Tyrus reported was his most popular Fox News segment: skewering the hypocrisy of Black Lives Matter. While he says hes personally experienced some rare over-policing, hes rightly incensed by people unfairly demonizing police while trying to excuse their actual crimes.

Of course, these BLM sympathizers are abetted by weak district attorneys funded by billionaire George Soros and Vice President Kamala Harris, who elevate criminals over actual victims. Tyrus money line in the Fox segment: If you choose to resist arrest, that doesnt make you Rosa Parks. That makes you a criminal.

This sense that Tyrus rejects victimhood leads him over and over to reinvention beyond a broken home, beyond broken football dreams, beyond political labels. He said he voted for Barack Obama twice, in part for the aspirational nature of the first African-American president. But Tyrus also has warm words for former President Donald Trump.

Trump changed my mind, he affected the way I think, Tyrus writes. I like how important it was for Trump to expose the system for the common man. When he gave speeches and when he dealt with the press, he was very deliberate about putting information out there; for the most part, it gave voters a chance to really understand how ugly the back of the political kitchen was.

A former Never Trumper, Tyruss journey toward respecting the 45th president shouldnt surprise, given Trump was a fixture on the WWE scene. They are both scrappy showmen at heart in a sport rejected by Beltway elites.

One topic Tyrus doesnt touch was the long-running feud between Trump and Tyruss former employer, Snoop Dogg. Snoop made a video with a mock assassination of Trump and later depicted Trumps corpse in a remake of Ice CubesDeath Certificate cover. But Snoop put that behind him after Trump issued a last-minute pardon to Death Row Records co-founder Michael Harry-O Harris, absolving Harris of attempted murder and kidnapping.

I love what they did, Snoop said, according to the New York Post. Let them know that I love what they did. It is amazing what the work of God can actually bring to life to make people understand that there is a God.

Snoops evolution in some ways parallels Tyrus own evolution away from race-infused divisiveness. Just Tyrus is a roadmap for conservatives navigating Americas shifting cultural and racial landscape its a profile of a Big Tent voice the right should welcome.

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Tyrus's Memoir Shows How He Defeated Victimhood With Hard Work And Reinvention - The Federalist

President Joe Biden is failing miserably, but you wouldnt know it from the propaganda flooding your Twitter feed from dozens of seemingly normal Democrat accounts on Monday afternoon.

Within mere seconds of each other, dozens of accounts tweeted appreciation for Biden and Democrats in Congress for passing a $1.9 trillion spending bill that has definitively made already record-high inflation in the United States worse.

8.6+ million jobs under @JoeBiden didnt happen by accident. The American Rescue Plan got Americans vaccinated, helped schools stay open, and kept businesses hummingnot a single Republican in Congress voted for it, the accounts tweeted nearly simultaneously.

The barrage of pro-Biden lies came on Monday afternoon shortly after the Democratic National Committees main Twitter account thanked Biden for making the American job market the strongest its been since just after World War II, something Biden claimed in a speech this weekend.

This is, of course, a lie with no mention of rampant inflation and record-high gas prices that far outpace any job or wage growth. But that didnt stop the avalanche of copy and paste spin, copied from a DNC tweet posted on Saturday, from relentlessly plaguing anyone who searched American Rescue Plan on Twitter.

It is unclear who jumpstarted or funded the unsolicited Democrat messaging on Twitter feeds across the world. Even though the text was copied directly from the Democratic National Committee Twitter, the DNC did not respond to The Federalists request for comment.

What is clear, however, is that despite Twitters efforts to conceal its bot problem, users arent convinced that inauthentic accounts make up fewer than 5 percent of the companys users, as the Big Tech platform likes to claim.

Mega billionaire Elon Musk even threatened to derail his $44 billion offer unless Twitter shows definitive proof of <5% spam accounts.

My offer was based on Twitters SEC filings being accurate. Yesterday, Twitters CEO publicly refused to show proof of <5% [spam accounts]. This deal cannot move forward until he does, Muskwroteon May 17.

That was one day after Musk tweeted a poop emoji. at Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, who claimed that Twitter has a system designed to curb online bots.

More recently, on Monday, Musk requested data from Twitter and pledged to conduct his own analysis on the number of spam accounts on the platform since the Silicon Valley giant adheres to what the Tesla CEO has labeled lax testing methodologies. Musk claimed that Twitters stalling on bots is a clear material breach of Twitters obligations under the merger agreement and gives him the authority to back out of the deal.

In what appears to be a move inspired by Musks estimation that Twitter is made up of 20 percent bot accounts, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced he will be investigating the Big Tech company for potentially false reporting over its fake bot accounts in violation of the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act.

Paxton said non-human accounts not only push deceptive and annoying activity but may also inflate the value of the company and the costs of doing business with it, thus directly harming Texas consumers and businesses.

Twitter has received intense scrutiny in recent weeks over claiming in its financial regulatory filings that fewer than 5% of all users are bots, when they may in fact comprise as much as 20% or more, a press release from Paxtons office stated. The difference could dramatically affect the cost to Texas consumers and businesses who transact with Twitter.

Paxton gave Twitter until June 27 to hand over data and evidence of Twitters user and advertising practices.

Texans rely on Twitters public statements that nearly all its users are real people. It matters not only for regular Twitter users, but also Texas businesses and advertisers who use Twitter for their livelihoods, Paxton said. If Twitter is misrepresenting how many accounts are fake to drive up their revenue, I have a duty to protect Texans.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

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Who Is Paying For Twitter Bots To Spam With Stupid Pro-Biden Spin? - The Federalist

Sheryl Sandbergannounced last week that she is leaving her position as chief operating officer of Facebooks parent company, Meta the job that made her a billionaire and one of the highest-profile women in Silicon Valley. There is much to be said about her next venture as well as some unflatteringreportsabout the real reason for her departure, but its worth reflecting on how the end of her c-suite reign also marks a whimpering end to the Girlboss era.

Sandberg is of course known for her 2013 best-seller Lean In, in which she encourages women to defy sex roles and embrace ambition in the workplace by overcoming barriers that exist within ourselves.

We hold ourselves back in ways both big and small, by lacking self-confidence, by not raising our hands, and by pulling back when we should be leaning in, she writes.

While some feminists embraced leaning in as a rallying cry, others felt her advice failed to address issues of inequality like how not all women can afford full-time childcare so they can work late hours like Sandberg, nor do many women want to.

Society has moved on. We pay a lot more attention now to the structural disadvantages women have everything from sexual harassment to child care to no national paid maternity leave, feminist columnist Katha Pollitt told The New York Times.

I was a Sheryl Sandberg superfan. Then her Lean In advice failed me, another working mom wrote at Vox in 2018. Even the Girlboss icon herself, Michelle Obama, told a crowd on her sold-out book tour that, its not always enough to lean in, because that sh-t doesnt work all the time.

Some women felt empowered by taking a seat at the table or walking into their bosss office and demanding a raise. Still, others discovered that speaking up louder in meetings and working longer and harder hours did, in fact, notcatapult them to the top of male-dominated fields or, more importantly, make them any happier.

It turns out that after being given all the advice and tools needed to climb the corporate ladder, many women are outright rejecting Sandbergs vision of the corporate Girlboss life. Upon realizing that even if they did have the means to lean in, it wasnt actually what they wanted.

Although women have been waking up to the false promises of third-wave feminism since Sandberg hit the bestsellers list, Covid lockdowns were the nail in the coffin of the Girlboss era. As Ive written about before, nearly2 millionwomen have left the labor force entirely since February 2020 a 33-year record low.

Whether it was a welcome change or not (Looking at you, teachers unions), lockdowns gave many women the freedom to work less and not feel ashamed about it. The normalization of remote work and flexible schedules made it easier for many moms to reject the false choice of work and family, but also the freedom to choose only family.

Recently released data from the Centers for Diease Control that show a 2021 spike in birth rates may affirm this shift in womens lifestyle choices. Lyman Stone, at the Institute for Family Studies, surveyed 3,000 American women ages 18-44 to determine if this spike may have something to do with expanded access to remote work. Stone found that women with remote work capability or women who do not work at all show higher rates of family satisfaction than women who are employed but have no remote work option.

Institute for Family Studies/Lyman Stone

This happiness might be caused by an expectation of soon having a wedding or a new baby, or the improved family circumstances could possibly lead to more willingness to take the next step in relationships, Stone concedes. But taken together, these results do point to one possible explanation for the rapid rebound in births: expanded remote work.

This new frontier of remote work could not look more different from the vision Sandberg lays out in her book: a single woman taking a seat at a table full of male coworkers and bosses, secretly pumping breast milk with the door closed while on conference calls, and hiring extra help around the house to make up for late hours at the office.

Of course, Sandberg is a working mom herself and her book was careful to not admonish working moms or stay-at-home moms, but much of her advice now seems laughable post-Covid. Raising hands and taking a seat at the table doesnt quite translate on Zoom calls. One whole chapter of the book titled, Dont Leave Before You Leave, is spent instructing women to not lean back or step back at work when anticipating having children. Now, many young women are choosing jobs based on their conduciveness to family even before they accept the position.

Sandberg billed herself as charting a way for women to fight forbig corporate leadership roles they deserved, but instead, she aided in creating the feminist veil by which big corporate often justifies exploiting their labor by trying to prevent family formation (ergo, happiness). When big corporate competes with families for a womans attention, instead of cooperating withfamilies to help them provide for themselves, everyone loses, but especially women.

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The 'Lean In' Era Is Over, And That's Good For Everyone - The Federalist

Stop me if youve heard this story before: Leftist elites push a radical and damaging change on society. Pro-family conservatives object and try to fight back in politics. Leftists accuse conservatives of starting a culture war. Finally, Republicans surrender in the name of compromise.

Over and over again, this process has played out, to the point where many in the pro-family movement have despaired of ending the cycle. But it doesnt have to be this way. There is a simple solution to this problem: we must make Republicans fear us again by getting involved directly in elections.

Thats the goal of my organization, American Principles Project PAC, which just launched a six-figure ad campaign to defeat surrender-minded GOP Rep. Nancy Mace, R-S.C., in her primary on June 14. Well be delivering digital ads like this one directly to voters in order to educate them about Maces dangerous record as an advocate of capitulating to the transgender agenda.

Last year, along with 22 other House Republicans, Mace signed on to the erroneously named Fairness for All Act (FFA), a GOP-led bill that supposedly seeks to draw a truce between religious conservatives and the woke lefts demands on gender ideology. But the so-called compromise, unsurprisingly, is really just a wave of the white flag.

FFA would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the Civil Rights Act, unleashing the federal government to punish objectors to leftist gender ideology as it does race discriminators. It mandates that nearly all institutions, public and private, allow men who claim a female identity into womens activities and private spaces. The few exemptions it contains are restricted mostly to churches and explicitly religious organizations, and its conscience protections are absurdly vague FFA leaves it to activist judges, for example, to decide if a doctors refusal to perform a sex change on a child constitutes illegal discrimination.

Last year, FFA seemed to have some momentum. Rumors were swirling around Capitol Hill that a Republican might even introduce it in the Senate. But fortunately, things have begun to change since then.

The conservative movement united in opposition. Academics such as Professor Robert George of Princeton University and Ryan Anderson, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, savaged the bills legal flaws. Organizations including the Heritage Foundation, Family Research Council, and Concerned Women for America detailed some of the bills most ridiculous impacts, highlighting the importance of Republican lawmakers opposing the bill.

FFA is now rapidly losing its existing support in the House. Of the 23 Republicans who previously signed on to the bill, two have already left Congress, two have announced they arent running for re-election, and an additional four Rep. Jeff Van Drew, R-N.J., Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., Rep. Chris Jacobs, R-N.Y., and Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y. have bravely pulled their support.

Much of this has to do with the political environment. After a slew of national news stories demonstrating the disastrous consequences of policies that allow men in womens sports, changing rooms, and bathrooms and an uprising among parents against radical gender ideology in schools, especially after a highly publicized sexual assault that took place due to a transgender bathroom policy in Loudoun County, Virginia support for the bill started to look bad for Republicans.

FFA would have mandated all these policies and more nationwide. Polling from our organization and others have shown that voters as a whole, including Democrats and independents, absolutely hate that idea.

Still, some sponsors, such as Mace and Rep. Peter Meijer, R-Mich., remain sponsors of the legislation. Its hard to know exactly why. Perhaps its legislative incompetence maybe they have no idea what the bill would do. Perhaps its a complete ignorance of or disregard for the opinions of their constituents.

But in Maces case, the most likely explanation is that she has truly bought into leftist gender ideology. She has been outspoken in her defense of the bill, essentially describing it as a common-sense requirement of basic justice.

Our strategy here is simple. We want to replace Mace with a stronger Republican, and her primary challenger Katie Arrington, who signed American Principles Projects Big Family Pledge, would certainly be an upgrade.

But we also hope to do more than just remove a subpar legislator from Congress. Were trying to demonstrate that there are political consequences to betraying the pro-family movement. We aim to show other weak-kneed politicians that these mealy-mouthed capitulation tactics dont work, and may even cost them their seats.

Politicians, especially those whose sympathies naturally lie with the left, often dont change their tune due to a genuine change of heart. They change because they think theyll be punished at the ballot box if they dont. If we want Republicans to stop surrendering to the woke left on all sorts of issues, weve got to show there are serious consequences for doing so. Defeating Nancy Mace on June 14 and obtaining an important scalp for the pro-family movement would be a good first step.

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Defeating This Gender-Bending Republican Will Help Protect Women - The Federalist

Imagine picking up a copy of the Washington Post (as if you ever would) and reading the headline, Why White people are afraid of crazy Black people. Setting aside the obvious reasons that would come to mind, youd immediately realize you were dreaming and wake up, because the Post would never run such a thing.

But it would and did publish the inverse in a column this week by the thickly spectacled Jonathan Capehart. Black people are not afraid of White people, he wrote. Were afraid of crazy White people.

Capehart, who is black, went on to say he and other People of Color have come to live in great fear of whites who profess to believe in the so-called great replacement theory, wherein Americas political leaders are deliberately remaking the countrys electorate via mass immigration. (Up until recently, Democrats and plenty of Republicans simply referred to this as default policy.)

He cited a recent survey claiming that 75 percent of blacks are at least somewhat worried that they or someone they love will be assaulted because of their race.

And its all because the number of crazy White people in America fearing replacement appears to be growing, wrote Capehart, and they seem ready to do whatever it takes to stay at the pinnacle of American life.

Anyone can be somewhat worried about anything for any reason at all. Im often somewhat worried that the airplane Im in wont properly lift off. Similarly, that fear isnt based on the reality that such a thing pretty much never happens.

That whites at large have become blood-thirsty savages ready to violently attack blacks or other minorities isnt born out by any data. In 2020, the most recent year for which FBI data is available (and what a fun year that was!), the race of the offenders of all violent crime which includes homicide, rape, robbery and aggravated assault is split evenly between blacks and whites, 44 percent each.

What should cause Capehart to blush a little is that blacks make up just 13 percent of the U.S. population. In other words, almost half of the nations violent crimes that year were committed by members of a race that only comprises one-tenth of the people who live in that nation. Whats more, the victims of those crimes in 2020 were more likely to be white (56 percent) than black (38 percent).

Go back the previous two years, and the numbers are just the same. Theres also the fact that interracial violent crime, at least as far as homicide goes, is fairly rare. Blacks are usually the victims of other blacks, and the same is true for whites. (To that, Capehart said Wednesday on MSNBC, Thats not the point!)

So, tell me again who has more reason to be afraid of the crazy who?

Trick question. Dont be afraid of people based on their race. Although if you really wanted to make Capehart blush, youd point out that his husband is white. Hopefully not a crazy one.

See the article here:

WaPo's Capehart: Black People Should Be Scared Of 'Crazy White People' - The Federalist

Members of the House Select Committee on Jan. 6, vice chaired by Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, are preparing to launch a major assault on the Electoral College as part of the probes end proposals.

According to Axios on Monday, members of the House panel are split on ideas for electoral reform, which now appears to dominate the committees talk of legislation that will emerge from the politicized probe designed to persecute political dissidents.

Axios reported that the panels far-left members, including Jamie Raskin of Maryland and Adam Schiff of California, have endorsed exploiting the committee to pursue their long-desired destruction of the Electoral College. In contrast, Cheney, who represents the least populated state in the nation with the most to lose, thinks the committee will burn its credibility if it pushes for radical changes like abolishing the Electoral College, according to a source with direct knowledge.

She also has joked to her colleagues on the committee that theres no way the single at-large representative for the tiny state of Wyoming would support abolishing the Electoral College, Axios added, citing another source with direct knowledge of internal committee deliberations.

With fewer than 580,000 residents, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, Wyoming is home to fewer people than the District of Columbia. The Electoral College, however, guarantees the state three electors to cast votes in presidential elections. While one elector represented 712,000 people in California in 2016, the last time the victor lost the official popular vote but captured the White House, one elector in Wyoming represented 195,000 people. The system at the foundation of the republic offers Wyomings rural residents influence that would otherwise be erased by the abandonment of the Electoral College.

Cheneys Trump-endorsed primary challenger, attorney Harriet Hageman, blasted the three-term incumbents championing of the J6 Committee, which is now on a path to dismantle the institution that guarantees Wyomings too-often-overlooked constituents a voice in their government.

The Electoral College ensures that states with lower population still have a voice in electing the president, Hageman told The Federalist. If the Electoral College were abolished, presidential elections would be decided by liberal voters in California and New York, leaving states like Wyoming voiceless and disenfranchised.

This is the reality that Liz Cheney has created by entering into a partnership with the radical Democrats on the January 6 Committee, Hageman continued. The Democrats have always been using the committee as a political campaign weapon, and their true goal is unchecked, never-ending power. Cheney has pursued her own personal war on President Trump while the Democrats have used her to try to legitimize their illegitimate witch hunt and power grab. Liz Cheney has now gone beyond her failure to represent Wyomings interests and is now complicit in Democrat plans to permanently silence the people of Wyoming.

Tristan Justice is the western correspondent for The Federalist. He has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Daily Signal. His work has also been featured in Real Clear Politics and Fox News. Tristan graduated from George Washington University where he majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow him on Twitter at @JusticeTristan or contact him at Tristan@thefederalist.com.

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Liz Cheney's J6 Committee Wants To Nuke The Electoral College - The Federalist

A former Democrat congressman, who was expelled from the House of Representatives in 1980 after getting caught taking bribes in what turned out to be an FBI sting, pleaded guilty to multiple election fraud charges this week after the U.S. Department of Justice charged him with bribery, falsifying voting records, stuffing ballot boxes, and more election crimes in Pennsylvania.

According to U.S. Attorney Jennifer Arbittier Williams, 79-year-old Michael Ozzie Myers admitted to bribing Philadelphia election judge Domenick J. Demuro, who already pleaded guilty in 2020, during the 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 state elections for $300 to $5,000 per election and then telling him to lie about falsely inflating votes.

Demuro, who was responsible for overseeing the entire election process and all voter activities of his Division in accord with federal and state election laws, then manipulated the voting machines in his respective ward and division in a way that satisfied Myers desire to illegally add votes for certain candidates of their mutual political party in primary elections, especially those clients who paid him consulting fees.

Some of these candidates were individuals running for judicial office whose campaigns had hired Myers, and others were candidates for various federal, state, and local elective offices that Myers favored for a variety of reasons, the DOJ noted in a press release.

Myers pulled the same stunt with another South Philadelphia election judge Marie Beren, who also pleaded guilty in 2021 to her role in the fraud.

Myers acknowledged in court that on almost every Election Day, Myers transported Beren to the polling station to open the polls. During the drive to the polling station, Myers would advise Beren which candidates he was supporting so that Beren knew which candidates should be receiving fraudulent votes. Inside the polling place and while the polls were open, Beren would advise actual in-person voters to support Myers candidates and also cast fraudulent votes in support of Myers preferred candidates on behalf of voters she knew would not or did not physically appear at the polls, the DOJ stated.

The pair also used cell phone communication to notate in real-time how many votes they faked versus how many were real.

If actual voter turnout was high, Beren would add fewer fraudulent votes in support of Myers preferred candidates. From time to time, Myers would instruct Beren to shift her efforts from one of his preferred candidates to another. Specifically, Myers would instruct Beren to throw support behind another candidate during Election Day if he concluded that his first choice was comfortably ahead, the press release continued.

Much like Demuro, Beren then falsified poll books by recording the names, party affiliation, and order of appearances for voters who had not physically appeared at the polling station to cast his or her ballot in the election and balanced the list with the ballots recorded by voting machines before certifying the tainted results.

Myers guilty plea adds to the long list of systemic voting issues and election law violations already plaguing Pennsylvania, where voters recently waited weeks to hear the results of the U.S. Senate Republican primary.

Jordan Boyd is a staff writer at The Federalist and co-producer of The Federalist Radio Hour. Her work has also been featured in The Daily Wire and Fox News. Jordan graduated from Baylor University where she majored in political science and minored in journalism. Follow her on Twitter @jordanboydtx.

Read more from the original source:

Former Dem Congressman Pleads Guilty To Rigging Elections In PA - The Federalist

This should have been Disneys time in the sun, basking in the rays from happy fans. The House of Mouse just released its biggest Star Wars project in years, Obi-Wan Kenobi, a show featuring its most popular Star Wars characters, only to have it land with a thud.

Most companies would analyze what went wrong and try to fix it, but not Disney. Instead of trying to understand fans distaste, Disney took the nuclear option and blasted their viewers as racists.

Obi-Wan Kenobi is the latest expensive and disappointing entry in Disneys cavalcade of streaming content. The story follows Jedi Master Obi-Wan Kenobi as he suffers a midlife crisis while trying to save a tween-age Princess Leia from the Empire. At best, its OK. At worst, its painful.

The selling point of a show like this is to bring back beloved characters from the admired Star Wars prequels. You would think traditional positive marketing and welcoming back those lifelong fans would be the smart play, but thats not what Disneys marketing department had in mind.

Just three days before the May 27 premiere, The Independent released an interview with actress Moses Ingram, who plays the tone-deaf antagonist Reva, telling interviewers Disney warned her to be ready for racist attacks from fans. She also said Director Deborah Chow went to lengths to put proper systems in place to protect the crew from feared fan racism. From the beginning to Disney, they were making clear that the real enemies werent the inquisitors but the fans.

Then just as the first reviews were coming in, Disney issued viral posts on Instagram and Twitter. We are proud to welcome Moses Ingram to the Star Wars family and excited for Revas story to unfold. If anyone intends to make her feel in any way unwelcome, we have only one thing to say: we resist, Disney wrote on their official social media.

Youd think that would be enough, but Disney isnt anything if persistent in advertising. The Mouse then grabbed Obi-Wan Kenobi himself, Ewen McGregor, in what looks like a hostage video, saying: if youre sending her bullying messages, youre no Star Wars fan in my mind.

At no point during this or later parts of this debacle, did credible evidence surface of a racist attack on Ingram, neither from Disney nor the media. Nevertheless, that didnt stop them from going on the hunt for their favorite targets: the nerds.

As if the Mouse had waved his magic wand, every mainstream and lefty outlet joined forces to attack the fandom. At first, the attacks either were unskeptical reports of the Ingram story, attacks using clips and quotes from celebrities like Trevor Noah, or claims of review bombing; meaning fake reviews put up by bots or trolls. However, this pretext quickly devolved as journos felt they had been given permission to bully.

A headline from NPR reads, Racist Star Wars fans arent new. Why doesnt Disney do more to protect its actors? The Week went with the trite The Star Wars fandoms racism problem. Other outlets, usually more left-wing, like Mother Jones, skipped the on-ramp entirely. Why Cant the Star Wars Nerds Imagine a World With Black People?

Everyone from local news outlets to national papers like The Guardian, to popular magazines like Wired, to blogspam like Screen Rant, to more hoity-toity fare like Fast Company, and everything else in between got in on the orgy of media violence. Leading to my personal favorite, from Mel MagazineTheres No Bigger Loser Than A Racist Star Wars Fan.

In response to this media bombardment, the Babylon Bee pithily retorted: I Wish They Had Made This Black Character More Interesting, Says Star Wars Fan Who Is A Racist.

This isnt the first time the media piled on Star Wars fans. After The Last Jedi debuted, a popular hate article topic circulated, created by Rian Johnson calling fans manbabies and blaming fans for bullying Kelly Marie Tran off social media. On Twitter, you find Last Jedi haters next to GamerGate for being partially responsible for everything from politics to mass shootings. Whats different now is the scale of the attack, and that its Disney leading the charge.

Consider that these attacks began before Obi-Wan Kenobi was even released. Disney knew it might have an expensive turd on its hands, and it needed some way to justify the rumored $25 million per episode budget. So, what do you do in this year of our Lord 2022? You go with woke anti-marketing, enlisting the media to save your show and protect it from any potential criticism both from reviewers and fans alike.

More frustrating is that this strategy might actually work, at least in the short term. Obi-Wan is getting talks of a second season, and while the audience score for the show on Rotten Tomatoes is middling around 59 percent, the review scores remain a high 87 percent. Disney knows if the media puts out 500 articles about a show, then the project is staying on top of the Google search results for a good long time.

But is Disney eating its own tail? Are they expecting new fans to appear after digesting their programs and forgetting about their newest streaming bore-fest? Can you tell me what happened in Captain Falcon: Winter Soldier? Because I know I cant.

These shows are lackluster, boring, generic, and forgettable. As seen with Johnny Depp and Amber Heards death blow to Me Too, people are sick of false prudish wokeness. People may defend woke Disney, but few like it. It isnt Rey Skywalker that fans want to be, but Luke.

Peter Pischke is a journalist and health and disability reporter. He can usually be found manning the Happy Warrior Substack and Podcast, providing commentary on news and nerdery of the day. You can find him on Twitter: @happywarriorp.

Excerpt from:

Disney Relies On Cries Of Racism To Boost 'Obi-Wan Kenobi' Series - The Federalist