First, any civil or criminal defendant in a federal case who plausibly asserts that political or ideological factors may taint a jury pool can veto the Washington DC circuit and receive a hearing in his or her choice of another randomly chosen circuit or the circuit of his or her home dwelling.

Second, regardless of what circuit a federal case is filed in, any civil or criminal defendant who plausibly asserts that political or ideological factors may taint a jury pool shall be entitled to a jury pool that is proportionally selected from a region that did not vote more than 70 percent in favor of one party’s candidate in the most recent presidential, senatorial, or congressional election.

Third, plaintiffs or prosecutors in a federal case may elect to have the case decided in a randomly assigned circuit other than the District of Columbia. This would ensure that corrupt and criminal Democrats do not get a free pass on anything they do simply because they know a DC jury pool would never convict them of anything, no matter how egregious the offense.

Fourth, Congress should mandate that any states receiving federal funds for any legal or law enforcement purposes must abide by the same rules guaranteeing a defendant a politically fair jury pool.

Fifth, state legislators should enact similar laws ensuring political fairness for trials in their state.

In summary, all Americans are entitled to a jury of our peers, or at least a jury that is not politically biased. Unfortunately, conservative Americans are being increasingly subjected to politically weaponized lawfare. //

Indylawyer
10 hours ago
This is a badly needed reform. Excellent point. We also need to eliminate most federal criminal statutes, and make sure the ones that are left are clearly and narrowly defined. They wouldn't be able to wage most of this lawfare without these vague and overweening criminal statutes. //

anon-8gsr
12 hours ago
All this articles says to me is conservatives have been woefully neglectful in preparing to fight the opposition, and still are. We all knew that though.

GBenton anon-8gsr
12 hours ago
If Trump wins in November we have to view this as the last opportunity to right the ship. After what Biden has done, including the lawfare and threats to pack the Supreme Court and end the filibuster, the mission is to destroy the corruption and neutralize the threat should a Democrat win in 2028.

That said, I think if the American people knew the full truth about the left there might not be much of a Democrat party for a while. Trump should declassify anything and everything on the Dems and their corruption going back to JFK (and before, as relevant), since I believe they had JFK killed, they set up Nixon, and they have their fingerprints on a whole lotta bad stuff including Waco, etc, not to mention what Hillary and Obama did.

Expose all the dirt. make it public.

GBenton Arik
12 hours ago
Stealing elections needs to carry a price similar to treason since it interferes with the peaceful tranfer of power and threatens the stability and survival of the republic and invites tyranny. //

As Alito has famously said in the past, Congress did not create the Supreme Court, the Constitution did. It is not any Democrat hack's job to "fix" the court, and certainly, no one in Congress has the credibility to do absolutely anything regarding it.

"Fixing" it isn't the real purpose of the current left-wing hysteria, though. The real purpose is to garner more power.

Thank you, Your Honor. I appreciate it. Family, friends, and allies and foundationalists and honored adversaries, today we enter the next phase in the fight to protect our God-given rights from a government that wishes to take them from us and grant us mere privileges in return. To quote another patriot from another place and time, "This is not the end. This is not even the beginning of the end. This is perhaps, the end of the beginning."

And so, as we enter this new phase, there should be no question in the mind of any patriotic American as to why we fight. After all, only slaves lack the right to arm self-defense and we are no slaves, but free citizens of a great republic and we contain multitudes each of us from builder, a healer, a teacher, a statesman, a soldier, a judge, an attorney at law, a sergeant at arms, and an image of God. So, we know why we fight.

The question before us is how we must fight. What kind of discipline we must bring with us into battle and what spirit we must show to our friends and adversaries alike and by way of answering, we refer to our core doctrines.

The foundationalist's manifesto calls us to listen closely and to speak clearly. To deny the self at the same time to defend the individual. To respect tradition and also to cultivate the future. In short, as foundationalists, we are called to embrace disciplines that seem to contradict each other but nonetheless, to embrace them with all of our strength.

So, it is in our current fight because this system as dysfunctional as it often is, as unjust as it often is, it is nonetheless, our system. It is a feature not a bug of our American civilization. Like any other structure built from man's crooked timber, it is not perfect. Judges and attorneys and trial courts and juries in the light of day are not perfect. Judges and attorneys and trial courts and juries in the light of day are merely what we have instead of the blood feud and the vendetta and the dagger in the dead of night.

Knowing this, we give challenge even as we give thanks. Knowing this, we prepare ourselves for battle in a spirit of profound dissatisfaction and profound gratitude in equal measure.
...
When I was a boy my grandfather told me that fire is a great servant, but a terrible master and so it is with Government. And to the extent that our own Government attempts to be our master, we must oppose it. We must fight to the utmost limits of our strength, but in that fight, our spirit must be one of restoration, not destruction. We must confront the enemy as the firefighter confronts his enemy and for the same reasons that the structure itself may yet, be saved.

God bless and keep you all and may God bless the United States of America. Thank you, Your Honor.

Democrats pushing the so-called “Equal Rights Amendment” failed to follow the required procedure for advancing a constitutional amendment. Equal Protection Project had opposed the attempt to embed CRT and DEI in the state constitution.

Central to the former Justice Antonin Scalia law clerk's arguments in January and Thursday is that when a man becomes president, he becomes a part of the constitutional machinery, no longer a regular citizen.

In this construct, the president is always the president, and the only way to laicize him is through a House impeachment and a Senate conviction for conduct that then becomes vulnerable to criminal prosecution. //

etba_ss Cappy Hamper
2 hours ago
It is actually worse. Roberts is the worst sort of justice, where in an attempt to preserve the "integrity" of the Court and avoid wading into political matters, his decisions are always guided by politics, not the law. In an effort to appear above politics, he is the most political creature on the Court.

Not political in the sense of advancing one party, but political in that every decision is filtered through the lens of how it will be viewed, the consequences, attacks, and preserving the Court's power. He sees himself as the hero of the SCOTUS, whose job it is to protect its power far more than to correctly interpret the Constitution and the law. This is why he upheld Obamacare under the "tax" provision, while ignoring that he had to disagree with his own opinion to take the case up. This is why he wanted to uphold the LA law in Dobbs, but not overturn Roe.

I think it would be preferable if they had pictures of him. Instead, he really just is this cowardly, feckless, weak and depraved. //

Random US Citizen etba_ss
2 hours ago
Roberts has turned the SC in to My Lai--he's destroying the court in order to "save" it. History isn't going to look kindly on that, either because constitutional order will fail and Roberts attacks on the rule of law will be seen as one cause of the collapse, or because constitutional order will prevail (an unlikely outcome) and he'll be seen as an obstacle that had to be overcome.

Caedite eos. Novit enim Dominus qui sunt eius. //

anon-of-yo-biz
2 hours ago
Is it really being argued that Bin laden was a "political" enemy? Was Hitler a "political" enemy? Can we never object against tyranny, hatred, and murder unless we have compatible political or religious views? It seems that the word bigot has grow to include all forms of just resistance. //

Cafeblue32 anon-of-yo-biz
an hour ago edited
This is intentional. The left is destroying language by making specific terms no longer their definition, or getting rid of them altogether. The purpose of language is clear and precise comminication so as to not be misunderstood and creat a bunch of unneccesary problems.The left's purpose is to deconstruct language to be less clear, so specific sexes become they/thems, Catperson, or whatever the hell. They remove gender indicators in gender-specific languages. They use persons instead of men and women, family units instead of marriage and family, how is everyone instead of "How are you guys doing?" The more generic they can make the language, the more they can re-invent it to mean whatever they want it to mean.

And here we are-men are women, Israel is genocidal, Palestine is a legitimate state, Putin is ready to roll into New York, illegal able bodies men wearing expensive jeans and sneakers are refugees, illegal squatters are residents, the American flag is racist and the LGBTGFY flag is to fly high above them all everywhere an American flag is flown around ther world. Working class conservatives are racists and fascists while Palestininas calling for the end of Jews and demand for sharia law are freedom fighters. Etc etc.

Rush said it long ago: words mean things. That's why they work so hard to destroy them.

Ruling: Thumbprint scan is like a "blood draw or fingerprint taken at booking." //

The US Constitution's Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination does not prohibit police officers from forcing a suspect to unlock a phone with a thumbprint scan, a federal appeals court ruled yesterday. The ruling does not apply to all cases in which biometrics are used to unlock an electronic device but is a significant decision in an unsettled area of the law.

The US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit had to grapple with the question of "whether the compelled use of Payne's thumb to unlock his phone was testimonial," the ruling in United States v. Jeremy Travis Payne said. "To date, neither the Supreme Court nor any of our sister circuits have addressed whether the compelled use of a biometric to unlock an electronic device is testimonial."

Opening Statement

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) began the proceedings by seeking unanimous consent on several procedural matters.

Chad Pergram @ChadPergram
·
Senate makes offer for 7 points of order and 60 minutes debate time on 1st article of impeachment. Then 1 pt of order and 60 minutes of debste on then Senate vote to dismiss the charges and then to adjourn the court of impeachment
1:56 PM · Apr 17, 2024 //

Objection

Senator Eric Schmitt @SenEricSchmitt
·
The American people deserve a full impeachment trial of Sec. Mayorkas.

I will not assist Senator Schumer in setting our Constitution ablaze and bulldozing 200 years of precedent.

2:35 PM · Apr 17, 2024 //

Procedural Wrangling

Cruz asked for a roll call vote on his motion. That vote failed 51-49 (along party lines).

Senator John Kennedy (R-LA) then made a motion to adjourn immediately until noon on Tuesday, April 30. That also resulted in a roll call vote, which, again, failed 51-49 along party lines.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) then rose to reiterate the purpose of an impeachment trial and moved to table Schumer's point of order. Resulting in a third roll call vote with the same vote breakdown. //

The roll call vote on Lee's motion also went down 51-49. //

Scott's motion was defeated in a 51-49 roll call vote. //

Kennedy's second motion was shot down 51-49. //

Senator Roger Marshall (R-KS) then moved to adjourn until November 6, 2024, to "allow the American people" to have a say in it. As one might expect, this motion, too, was defeated 51-49. //

Kennedy then moved to go into executive session before establishing a "breathtaking precedent." Again, the motion failed 51-49.

Minority Whip John Thune (R-SD) then rose and moved to table Schumer's point of order (as to Article II). The motion went down 51-49. //

Murray confirmed that they would indeed establish impeachment precedent.

Finally, a vote was held on Schumer's second point of order (to dismiss Article II). That vote, like all the others, was a party-line split, with 51 Democrats voting in favor of it, 49 Republicans. The result? Article II of the impeachment was ruled unconstitutional and dismissed. Schumer then moved to adjourn, which, of course, passed...51-49.

And the impeachment of Alejandro Mayorkas went down without a trial. //

Closing Argument

... the Republicans always knew this would never go anywhere due to the Senate majority, but rather than give the Democrats a chance to look like they played fair and gave the Republicans some say in it, they're just blowing it up upfront, so that they can point out that the Democrats are shredding the Constitution, or, as Schmitt put it, "setting our Constitution ablaze and bulldozing 200 years of precedent."

Further, I suspect the points made by Wicker and Kennedy regarding lying to Congress (a felony) not constituting a high crime and misdemeanor under the precedent the Democrats have now set by dismissing Article II of the impeachment without holding a trial will come back to bite the Democrats ... //

Daily Caller
@DailyCaller
·
Follow
McConnell speaking on impeachment trial of Mayorkas: 'Tabling articles of impeachment would be unprecedented in the history of the Senate. It's a simple as that.'

11:58 AM · Apr 17, 2024 //

Madame President, the Senate just swore an oath to do impartial justice according to the Constitution and the laws of our country. We swore to discharge a duty that is quite different from our normal work. As a court of impeachment, we are called not to speak, not to debate, but to listen — both to the case against the accused and to his defense.

At this point in any trial in the country, the prosecution presents the evidence of the case, counsel for the defense does the same, and the jury remains silent as it listens. This is what our rules require of us as well. But the Senate has not had the opportunity to perform this duty. The Senate will not hear the House Managers present the details of their case against Secretary Mayorkas — that he willingly neglected the duties of his office and that he lied to Congress about the extent of that failure. Likewise, we will not hear the secretary's representatives present the vigorous defense to which he is entitled.
...
This process must not be abused; it must not be short-circuited. History will not judge this moment well. //

anon-adwq
5 hours ago
The Senate trial of Mayorkas would have established each Democrat running for reelection as a supporter of massive illegal immigration when he/she voted to acquit. Schumer upended 227 years of precedent and the Constitution of the United States to avoid that. However, each Democrat Senator's vote is on record as supporting massive illegal immigration by torpedoing the Mayorkas impeachment trial. The Republican Senate campaign ads still have the Democrat's vote on record. Job done. Nice try, Schumer. Nice work, Speaker Johnson.

Article II accuses him of knowingly making false statements.

This is a violation of 18 USC Section 1001, a felony offense. If this is not a high crime and misdemeanor, what is? If this is not impeachable, what is? What precedent will we be setting? We need to address this, we need to discuss it in closed session.

For that reason, Madam President, I move that the Senate proceed with closed session to allow for deliberation on this very consequential point of order that he's just made that violates hundreds of years of Anglo-American legal precedent and understanding, on the question required by impeachment rule 24.

when we won, when we had an injunction in place actually for the Biden administration to keep this very important protection in place, they ignored it. We had to go back in front of a judge time and time again to get them to abide by the law. But what we have found out from this administration — and Secretary Mayorkas specifically — is that he is willing, he himself is willing, to subvert the law, to believe that he is above the law, to lie and to commit a felony that this chamber now has said doesn't rise to the level of a high crime and misdemeanor — forever. That is the precedent forever. //

And as the back and forth in that United States v. Texas and Missouri case, from Justice Kavanaugh to the solicitor general of the United States indicated, what is the remedy here? And the Department of Justice's own lawyer said, 'Well, they have the remedy of impeachment.' But I guess we don't actually have that anymore. //

The Senate lost an opportunity to hear evidence to hold someone accountable today. //

anon-fe9p
an hour ago edited
This should give the answer to everyone demanding Biden's impeachment... If they wouldn't even hold the trial for Mayorkas there is no way they will hold one for Biden so voting to impeach him just became entirely irrelevant.

At this point they just need to keep the investigation going and keep feeding the information they gain about his corruption into the news cycle all the way through November so he can't get away from it. The political blow with voters is the only thing of any relevance that can come out of an impeachment inquiry now. //

kamief
an hour ago
Okay, here is how I see this.
The dems, must have known that if an impeachment trail where to happen, some things even worse was going to come out than what the impeachment was about? Correct me if that is a wrong assumption.
Otherwise, way play this out this way when they know that they are setting a rule that could come back to bit them in ass. How important is Mayorkas?

What am I missing? //

Sklish
an hour ago
There will be no more impeachments, ever. Chuck U has seen to that. Unless they try and impeach him for treason. If they ask for volunteers to carry out the sentence, there won't be enough ammo in stock to meet the demand.

Jennifer Oliver O'Connell @asthegirlturns
·
Now add promotion of how Life Wins in every state by Republican elected officials of that state. Learn what's happening in your own backyard and support it. Half of these reps have no clue.

Bonchie @bonchieredstate
Trump took the right position on abortion.

Practically, more babies are saved by 6-week bans in some states than some compromise that allows abortion until 15-20 weeks nationwide and that Dems build on.

The only way you preserve pro-life wins is keeping it a state issue.
10:42 PM · Apr 8, 2024 //

But no amount of legislation is going to convert hearts and minds. That is up to us. We must not just promote a culture of Life, but emulate it at every turn, and Fr. Pavone reaffirmed that this is where the church is critical. //

Indylawyer
an hour ago
Pro-lifers need to understand that the battle has shifted from a court battle to a legislative one. Prior to Dobbs, the overriding political objective for pro-lifers was overturning Roe, and a key part of doing that was to keep the fight against it alive. It was critical that at least one party maintain a pro-life position to show that the Roe could not be regarded as settled by consensus.
...
The symbolism of a pro-life political party is less critical because many of America's states have now enacted laws prohibiting it in most situations. Instead, we need to be actively pushing legislation in every state to maximize the protection of the unborn. A 15 week ban might still be useful to highlight Democrat extremism in a state like Illinois or New York, but it should be regarded as abject surrender in most red states. Federal legislation may be necessary to support state laws and perhaps eventually prevent a handful of states from providing abortion havens to undermine their pro-life sisters. But that is far in the future and we have a hard fight to get there. For now, the main thing we need from the federal government is to stay out of the way and allow the states to protect the unborn. A federal half-measures like a 15-week limit would be difficult to enforce, would have little impact on the number of abortions, and would undermine the state efforts to go farther. I hope Trump speaks out against some of the radical pro-abortion ballot measures that are being proposed, he'd be a valuable voice in that fight. But his basic position for now is correct - it is a state issue and should stay that way.

To this point, the conservative justices have shown some skepticism of the government's case, which U.S. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar is presenting. On that front, Justice Neil Gorsuch asked a question that many of us have been pondering. Namely, he asked whether Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), who pulled a fire alarm before an important House vote and impeded a congressional proceeding, could be charged under the same statute. Astonishingly, the government responded with a "no." //

Returning to Bowman, he pulled a fire alarm during a voting session in the House of Representatives. Congressional members had to be evacuated, and the vote was postponed. That is a textbook example of obstructing an official proceeding, and the government's justification for not charging him is basically "because we say it doesn't count." //

etba_ss
an hour ago
I'm not sure they really care at this point. They've milked and milked and milked J6 as much as they can. They've set an example and a standard that they can do whatever they want to you if your politics do not align. The time to have been providing relief in these cases is not April 2024, but in April 2021.

I don't mean to say that it doesn't matter, but this is one of those issues that the damage has largely been done on. The whole point of J6 is to influence elections and suppress dissent, including covering up fraud and electioneering during the 2020 election. All serious efforts at exposing the issues in 2020 stopped after J6. That was the main purpose and it was instantly successful.

The time is coming where Governors, state legislators, sheriffs, etc. decide if they will follow the law and the Constitution or the federal government and the court system. The two things are not the same. We shouldn't ignore the courts for "light and transient causes", but if our Founders were willing to pick up a musket and risk the very real possibility of being hung for traitors, telling the federal government and/or the federal courts "no" isn't too much to ask. Again, you don't do this because you disagree with some largely irrelevant statute, but when it comes to such basic things as border security, liberty and political prosecution, those things aren't "light and transient causes", but ones that are fundamental to the existence of a constitutional republic. //

etba_ss Hallen
38 minutes ago edited
The problem with the court upholding the law, even if they thought it was valid and could be applied is that selective prosecution violates a higher law. The Constitution is supreme to the court or to any Congressionally issued statute or law. The Constitution includes "equal protection under the law". Selective prosecution on the basis of political connections or ideology is a direct violation of the US Constitution. So Congress could pass a law saying that it is illegal to be a Republican. That law would violate the Constitution and be thrown out.

So either the law itself must be thrown out, or at least its application in this case must be thrown out. It is a gross violation of the Constitution, which is what Gorsuch is pointing out.

As it stands now, the law, which is set to expire April 19, allows U.S. intelligence agencies to spy on foreign nationals based overseas, but it also lets the FBI comb through the massive amounts of data the intelligence community collects and gather information about American citizens. These are known as “backdoor searches,” //

they want to require that the FBI obtain a warrant before searching Section 702 data for information about Americans — a reasonable reform. The intelligence community, and the members of the House Intelligence Committee over whom they have influence, oppose this. //

Whatever the original justification of Section 702 was — in the wake of 9/11, the intelligence community argued that massive government surveillance capabilities were necessary to keep Americans safe from terrorist attacks — the purpose of it now is to enable the FBI to surveil Americans, especially Americans who express views and opinions the government deems to be a threat. //

But the intelligence community and the lawmakers on the Intelligence Committee dug in their heels, rejecting multiple compromise reform bills. These bills, wrote Goitein, “would have passed if IC/intel committees were willing to concede that Section 702 should not be used as a means of warrantlessly accessing Americans’ communications.” //

How bad is warrantless spying by our government? Pretty bad. In April 2022, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released its annual report that showed the FBI made more than 3.4 million search queries of the NSA database in 2021 on U.S. citizens. About a third of these were “non-compliant searches,” which means they fell outside the normal rules and regulations. In other words, they were illegal.

But that’s not all. As the X account @TheLastRefuge noted, from November 2015 to May 2016, the FBI and contractors for the DOJ/FBI conducted more than 1,000 illegal searches targeting Republican primary candidates.

TheLastRefuge @TheLastRefuge2
·
10) Although the number of the illegal search queries were redacted, we know the number is four digits from the size of the redacted text. More than 1,000 and less than 9,999.
6:20 PM · Apr 10, 2024. //

It’s time for ordinary Americans to wake up and realize what our government is doing to us. Under the pretext of keeping us safe from foreign terrorists, the intelligence community has erected a vast surveillance apparatus that targets American citizens — and it will not under any circumstances allow that apparatus to be reformed.

Which is why it should be dismantled completely.

the 1906 Antiquities Act. The century-plus-old law allows the commander-in-chief to unilaterally place additional public lands under enhanced federal protections by executive order.

While a national park is a large swath of land protected by an act of Congress, land with a “national monument” designation protects a “specific natural, cultural or historic feature.” The 1906 law, however, requires that the area preserved must be “the smallest area compatible with the proper care and management of the objects to be protected.”

President Obama had a habit of violating the law’s mandates to establish quasi-national parks without congressional approval. President Biden is carrying on the tradition. //

Designating public lands under monument status strips the multiple-use mandate that allows residents to capitalize and more freely recreate on public property.

On Monday, Donald Trump announced that his stance on abortion is that the states should decide the intricacies of their abortion laws within their respective territories. I found this to be a very solid move for a few reasons, chief among them is that it is the constitutional view, and it makes the abortion fight for pro-abortion groups that much harder to win. //

As I wrote later, the Republican Party could actually use this avenue of handing power to the states to great effect. They could remove a lot of the deciding power about a lot of subjects from the federal government, craft laws for the government that close the doors on these subjects forever, and hand all the deciding power to the states. They could rightfully bill it as giving the power back to the people.

This would have an insane amount of benefits. Not only would the Republican Party become the party of the people, but it would also result in far less chaos around the nation as power becomes more localized. //

I know this is a very solid path to take and that this iron is hot to strike thanks to the people being made well aware of just how bad centralized power can be, compliments of the Biden administration. The Democrats are well aware of the danger of this as well, and they actually reached out to corporate media sources to swiftly have them correct headlines about Trump's stance.

We got what we wanted. And that’s what some members of our party are mad about. They want a federal law controlling abortion. Except that’s not what we promised.

It’s hard to understand how one justifies dishonesty as a political strategy. That’s what this is. They are asking that we conduct a bait and switch. We promised that every state would decide for itself, and now it’s, “No, now we’re going to decide for you.” How do you expect people to react to that? We overturned Roe with the understanding that some states would be awesome and largely ban the barbarian practice and that other states, like my own California, would declare open season on fetuses. And that’s what has happened. But you know what? Thousands and thousands of lives have been saved. In the butchery states? No, abortion continues there. But we’ve made progress. We’ve saved lives.

We have to stop making the good the enemy of the perfect and start understanding that progress is made incrementally. The left imposed Roe v. Wade, which made a huge, horrifying leap in one fell swoop. And look what happened. It got overturned in one fell swoop.

The battle against abortion is not going to end by passing a law at the federal level. It just isn’t. First of all, it’s not clear Congress even could enact one. You know, we just threw out a ruling that said the federal government could make abortion laws. //

The Democrats have been beating us around the head with abortion. What they’ll do is call us liars if we try and pass an abortion law, and they have the advantage of truth because we didn’t promise this. We promised the opposite. It’s electoral poison, and there’s a lot more at stake than abortion – free speech, economic prosperity, and peace, to name just a few. But as for abortion itself, if the Democrats get the power, they’ll legalize it up to the moment that a kid gets his driver’s license. If you want to kill more kids, push for a federal abortion ban because that is a certain way of killing more kids.

The way to change abortion is to change hearts and minds one state at a time. I wish we could wave a magic wand and make this barbaric practice disappear. But I’m not a child. I understand that even things I believe in deeply are not going to just happen through the sheer power of rightness. We’ve got a lot of work to do. We can’t just wish the practice away because we accurately assess it as horribly wrong.

Is Donald Trump immoral for feeling the way he does about abortion? There are lots of pro-life people who are ticked off at him, but these people need to understand that Donald Trump, first of all, represents most Americans’ position and, second, that he was the most successful pro-life president in American history. This man has saved thousands upon thousands of lives through his judicial appointments who tossed out Roe. Trump hasn’t betrayed anybody. He just disagrees at the margins.

Trump is looking at things realistically and, yes, politically. And he damn well better look at things politically because there’s a lot more at stake here than abortion in 2024. A lot more.

In Federalist 83, Alexander Hamilton wrote that the plan of the Constitution is that the powers granted to Congress

“shall extend to certain enumerated cases. This specification of particulars evidently excludes all pretension to a general legislative authority, because an affirmative grant of special powers would be absurd as well as useless if a general authority was intended.”

This sounds so good. But it appears that he lied to us.

Perhaps Hamilton meant what he wrote at that time. But, once he became Secretary of the Treasury under President Washington, he did everything in his power to violate his own maxim. His scheme for the Bank of the United States is just one example. Where, o’ where does the Constitution provide Congress with the power to create a bank, or for that matter, any business corporation? Naturally, my question is rhetorical. //

And yet Hamilton, once he tasted power, quickly turned to “loose constructionism.” Indeed, his story is that of nearly every person in history who has exercised significant power. Man turns towards evil, and evil men (and women) love power. Many of us are familiar with Lord Acton’s “Absolute power corrupts absolutely” dictum. However, I think Erick von Kuehnelt-Leddin said it best: “A good man will not be corrupted by power, and a bad man will be corrupted with no power at all.” (Leftism Revisited, 317)

Hamilton’s problem is ours today in spades. Nearly all of us having fallen for the trap of loose constructionism, especially those who exercise power over us. We daily practice it- in the way we read our laws and the way we read things like the Bible. In fact, the proliferation of laws and regulations demands that we become loose constructionists, for if we tried to abide by the 4,000 plus new regulations our federal government promulgates each year, we couldn’t even live life. In this manner, the entire culture has been corrupted.

There are many today who support such things as a Convention of the States to redress the train wreck we are about to witness.

But unless we have a revival of strict constructionism, especially regarding higher law in our Constitutions and Scripture, we will merely change cars on the same doomed train.

James Madison is the Father of our Constitution, and the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at Madison’s Montpelier provides educational programming for teachers, law enforcement officers, and others.

That seems appropriate. After all, not only did Madison—our country’s fourth president—help draft the Constitution, but he also served as a key delegate at the Constitutional Convention, authored the Bill of Rights, and urged ratification of the Constitution through his practical and philosophical arguments in The Federalist Papers.

But these accomplishments are, at best, downplayed at his historic home. Montpelier has no exhibits dedicated to Madison and his contributions.

Worse still, Montpelier is equipping educators to teach Marxist-based theories to elementary, middle, and high school students. And the programs doing this are, in part, funded by the state of Virginia. //

It’s sad that Montpelier has chosen to focus on a Marxist-motivated movement fueled by critical race theory, instead of on the many astounding achievements of the home’s former owner and the Father of our Constitution, James Madison.

It’s a disservice to the public, teachers, and students.

The FBI posted a video of Director Christopher Wray testifying on March 11 and highlighting the "Bureau's compliance with Section 702 during the hearing at the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence." //

Community Notes kept it simple and blunt, "The FBI violated American citizens’ 4A rights 278,000 times with illegal, unauthorized FISA 702 searches." We reported on that in the past, so anything they say now has to be viewed through that lens.

READ: FBI Misused Surveillance Tool More Than 278,000 Times Including Against Jan. 6 People, BLM, Political Donors //

Weminuche45
2 hours ago edited
The 3 hop rule allows them to electronically surveil millions of people without even a FISA warrant against them, probably everyone.

Example:
Warrant for one person
Hop 1 - person with warrant has communicated with 136 people over the last 7 years IN ANY WAY.
137 people now
Hop 2 - those 136 people have communicated with 136 people
18,632 people now under surveillance
Hop 3 - 18,632 people x 137 people

2.5 MILLION people now under surveillance
From one FISA warrant.

No one seems to care much about this though, so it will continue.

U.S. District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman ruled on March 8 that a federal law prohibiting illegal immigrants from owning guns is unconstitutional, arguing the law did not adhere to the Supreme Court’s ruling in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen that stipulated gun control laws must fit historical tradition. //

But someone who broke the laws of the land and is illegally residing here is not entitled to the same rights that the Constitution secures for U.S. citizens. Foreign citizens instead must have their rights secured by their own governments.

The Second Amendment reads: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

The Supreme Court ruled in D.C. v. Heller that “the people” refers to “all members of the political community.” Foreign citizens are by definition members of a different political community. Writing for the majority, the late Justice Antonin Scalia wrote. “the people” “refers to a class of persons who are part of a national community or who have otherwise developed sufficient connection with this country to be considered part of that community.” //

The topic was also argued more than a decade ago in a different case, with a panel of the Fourth Circuit ruling in U.S. v. Carpio-Leon that “illegal aliens are not law-abiding members of the political community and aliens who have entered the United States unlawfully have no more rights under the Second Amendment than do aliens outside of the United States seeking admittance.”