Author Archives: Denise Simon

Executive Order to Protect Historic Monuments

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When mob rule exceeds at grabbing power over law and authority, anarchy is real. Such is the case in several cities across the country where mayors have failed at the duty of public safety and protection. Sadly, the President has to issue an Executive Order to preserve historical monuments. Sure, perhaps there is a time for some to be moved and replaced but not by anarchists. It should be considered by a vote, that is the American way.

Trump issues warning amid vandalism, effort to topple ...

There is already a law that protects Federal property, meaning that of antiquity and assigned to the National Parks Service. So, one must challenge the mayor(s) and District Attorneys at this point. If even Al Sharpton says justice must be equal….heh…so be it…make it equal and applied as such.

“We are looking at long-term jail sentences for these vandals and these hoodlums and the anarchists and agitators, and call them whatever you want,” Trump said. “Some people don’t like that language, but that’s what they are. They’re bad people. They don’t love our country. And they’re not taking down our monuments. I just want to make that clear.”

The executive order as Trump described it appeared to be largely symbolic. Existing law already makes it criminal to destroy “any structure, plaque, statue, or other monument on public property commemorating the service of any person or persons in the armed forces of the United States.”

18 U.S. Code § 1369. Destruction of veterans’ memorials

(a)

Whoever, in a circumstance described in subsection (b), willfully injures or destroys, or attempts to injure or destroy, any structure, plaque, statue, or other monument on public property commemorating the service of any person or persons in the armed forces of the United States shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.
(b) A circumstance described in this subsection is that—

(1)

in committing the offense described in subsection (a), the defendant travels or causes another to travel in interstate or foreign commerce, or uses the mail or an instrumentality of interstate or foreign commerce; or
(2)

the structure, plaque, statue, or other monument described in subsection (a) is located on property owned by, or under the jurisdiction of, the Federal Government.
As reported by HuffPo in 2017:

Several states have laws that make it extremely difficult to remove Confederate monuments. Here are five of the strictest.

North Carolina

In 2015, then-Gov. Pat McCrory, a Republican, signed a bill that gave the North Carolina General Assembly full power over public “objects of remembrance.”

Earlier this week, a group of protesters toppled a Confederate statue in Durham, and on Thursday, dozens of people lined up to turn themselves in for the “crime.”

The current governor, Democrat Roy Cooper, has said that the monuments “should come down” and that he wants the state law repealed.

Alabama

Alabama’s law is new. In May, Republican Gov. Kay Ivey signed the Alabama Memorial Preservation Act of 2017, which forbids “the relocation, removal, alteration, renaming, or disturbance of any architecturally significant building, memorial building, memorial street, or monument on public property which has been in place for 40 or more years.” Many of the nation’s Confederate monuments were erected in the early 20th century.

 The Committee on Alabama Monument Protection created by the act approves any modification to monuments.

Mississippi

 A Mississippi law says that statues, monuments, memorials or landmarks from previous wars cannot be removed unless they are being moved to another location or they obstruct drivers’ vision.

 Rep. John Moore (R-Miss.) told WTOK-TV in Meridian that he supports the law because the memorials can used to learn about history.

 “That’s one of the things about history,” Moore said. “If we cease to learn from it and don’t have reminders, we are doomed to repeat it.”

Georgia

 A law in the Peach State protects publicly owned military monuments from being relocated, removed, concealed, obscured or altered unless doing so would protect the monument or aid in its interpretation. A petition currently calls on state lawmakers to change the law.

Virginia

 In Virginia, ground zero of this latest iteration of the Confederate statue debate, it is illegal to disturb or interfere with any war monuments or memorials. There is an ongoing lawsuit over the Charlottesville City Council’s vote to remove the statue of Robert E. Lee that white supremacists and neo-Nazis gathered to defend. Opponents claim the removal of the statue is illegal under state law.

 

Executive Order Suspending Work Visas Extended

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The original executive order signed in April:

would temporarily suspends the issuance of new green cards, a limit on immigration he says will protect American jobs amid the coronavirus pandemic.

“In order to protect our great American workers, I have just signed an executive order temporarily suspending immigration into the United States,” Trump said at a White House briefing Wednesday.

“This will ensure that unemployed Americans of all backgrounds will be first in line for jobs as our economy reopens,” Trump continued. “It will also preserve our health care resources for American patients.”

***

President Donald Trump signed an executive order temporarily halting work visas like the H-1B visa program for highly-skilled workers, cutting off a critical source of foreign labor for tech companies already complaining about tech talent shortages.

Visa-holders already in the U.S. and those applicants who have already received a visa are exempt from the ban. The restrictions are intended to last until the end of the year, which would disrupt the government’s typical process of awarding new visas at the beginning of the national fiscal calendar in October.

Officials from the Trump administration told the Wall Street Journal that the move is intended to protect American jobs, but executives in the technology industry have long warned that visa restrictions would hurt the nation’s ability to compete in industries that have both strategic and financial significance as engines of economic growth. More here.

The renewal of the April Executive Order applies to H-1B, L-1 and J visas. The goal is to protect an estimated 525,000 jobs where American citizens get first priority.

“President Trump has repeatedly promised that he would put American workers first, and to his credit, he did just that,” said Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which advocates for lower levels of immigration. FAIR had called on Trump to suspend guest worker visas.

“For the most part, the president withstood intense pressure from powerful business interests that continue to demand more cheap foreign labor, even as they have laid off an unprecedented number of American workers over the past three months ” Stein said.

*** Trump to Sign New Executive Order Freezing Green Cards ...

Sadly, it takes an executive order to protect American citizens and their jobs…

President Donald J. Trump Is Putting American Workers First as We Restore Our Economy to Greatness

LEADING AN AMERICA FIRST RECOVERY: President Donald J. Trump is extending and expanding the suspension of certain visas through the end of the year to ensure American workers take first priority as we recover from the economic effects of the coronavirus.
  • President Trump is extending the pause on new immigrant visas through the end of the year to ensure we continue putting American workers first during our ongoing coronavirus recovery.
  • President Trump is building on this measure with an additional pause on several job-related nonimmigrant visas—H-1Bs, H-2Bs without a nexus to the food-supply chain, certain H-4s, as well as Ls and certain Js—preserving jobs for American citizens.
  • President Trump’s efforts will ensure businesses look to American workers first when hiring.
    • Many workers have been hurt through no fault of their own due to coronavirus and they should not remain on the sidelines while being replaced by new foreign labor.
  • The Trump Administration has also finalized regulations to eliminate the incentive to file an asylum application for the primary purpose of obtaining an Employment Authorization Document.
  • With some exceptions, we should not permit large numbers of foreign workers to enter the United States at a time when so many Americans are out of work.
MOVING TO A MERIT-BASED IMMIGRATION SYSTEM: The Trump Administration will reform our immigration system to prioritize the highest-skilled workers and protect American jobs.
  • At President Trump’s direction, the Trump Administration is taking action to reform our H-1B immigration program.
  • Under these reforms, the H-1B program will prioritize those workers who are offered the highest wage, ensuring that the highest-skilled applicants are admitted.
  • The Trump Administration will also close loopholes that have allowed employers in the United States to replace American workers with low-cost foreign labor.
  • These reforms will help protect the wages of American workers and ensure that foreign labor entering our country is high skilled and does not undercut the United States labor market.
WIDESPREAD SUPPORT FOR COMMONSENSE ACTION: The American people stand by President Trump as he takes commonsense action to preserve jobs for American citizens.
  • Polls show that the overwhelming majority of Americans support pausing immigration as we recover as a Nation from the coronavirus pandemic.
    • A Washington Post-University of Maryland poll found that 65% of those polled support pausing immigration into the country, including 61% of minority respondents.
    • A Pew Research Center poll found that 81% of Americans see mass immigration as a threat as we confront the challenges posed by the coronavirus.
  • Democrats and liberal commentators used to support such commonsense efforts to protect American jobs.
    • Sen. Bernie Sanders: “You think we should open the borders and bring in a lot of low-wage workers, or do you think maybe we should try to get jobs for those [American] kids?”
    • Paul Krugman stated that “Immigration reduces the wages of domestic workers who compete with immigrants. That’s just supply and demand.”
    • Then-Sen. Barack Obama warned that mass migration “threatens to depress further the wages of blue-collar Americans and put strains on an already overburdened safety net.”

 

Do You Recognize Chinese Propaganda?

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Fake accounts, false news stories, bots and media paid by Chinese operatives. Sounds like Russia right? Same playbook, only perhaps more aggressive. As a public service, this article provides you as an internet user, a consumer of news and holding accounts on social media, be fair warned you could be vulnerable to Chinese propaganda.

(UPI) — The Trump administration on Monday designated four more major Chinese state-run media outlets as foreign missions for being propaganda mouthpieces of the Chinese Communist Party, a move that will likely worsen already strained relations between Washington and Beijing and attract retaliatory measures.

China Central Television, China News Service, the People’s Daily and the Global Times were all designated Monday as foreign missions as they are “substantially owned or effectively controlled” by the Chinese government, State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said in a statement.

The companies will have to report the names of their staff and their real estate holdings to the Office of Foreign Missions within the State Department, treating the companies as arms of the Chinese government in the United States like foreign embassies or consulates.

“The decision to designate these entities is not based on any content produced by these entities, nor does it place any restrictions on what the designated entities may publish in the United States,” she said. “It simply recognizes them for what they are.” More here.

 

***

There is a backstory, a good one on how this came to be.

A radio station controlled by the Chinese Communist Party propaganda outlet Phoenix TV has been ordered by the Trump administration to cease its broadcasts within 48 hours.

Here’s how pro-China station Phoenix TV got into the White ... source

The Federal Communications Commission ruled on Monday that a Mexico-based radio station owned in part by Phoenix TV—one of the Communist regime’s leading propaganda organs—must end its broadcasts due to its failure to disclose its ties to China.

Prior to the FCC’s ruling, the station was exploiting a loophole that allows content produced in the United States to be broadcast from foreign radio towers, such as those in Mexico. Phoenix TV, which is headquartered in California, produced its content domestically and then used the more powerful Mexican station to broadcast across the U.S. border.

The FCC denied a license for that radio station, XEWW-AM, because it “failed to include in their application a key participant, Phoenix Radio, which produces the Mandarin programming in its studio,” the agency disclosed. Phoenix Radio, Phoenix TV’s radio affiliate, was using the station to broadcast Chinese propaganda across Southern California, in violation of FCC statutes.

Phoenix TV first found itself in Congress’s crosshairs earlier this year, after one of its reporters confronted President Donald Trump during a White House briefing about the coronavirus pandemic and Chinese government efforts to cover up the illness. The station’s presence at the White House generated concerns about the proliferation of Chinese state-controlled press organs in the United States.

The Mexican radio station failed to disclose Phoenix TV’s “extensive role” in producing content, an FCC spokesperson told the Washington Free Beacon. “It was a violation of the Communications Act for that company, which has ties to the Chinese government, not to be included on the application filed with the Commission. Therefore, the application was deficient and was dismissed.”

Phoenix TV used Mexican radio towers to skirt U.S. laws barring the dissemination of foreign propaganda in America. The FCC’s ruling is a sign the Trump administration seeks to more aggressively police these types of outlets, which for years have operated with little oversight. Congress has moved in recent months to crack down on a range of Chinese broadcasters and social media accounts that help the Communist regime saturate the American marketplace with state-approved propaganda.

The Free Beacon first reported in April that Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) was leading a charge to see the Mexican station shut down over its ties to Phoenix TV. Cruz introduced legislation exposing how Phoenix TV used a series of corporate cutouts to purchase the Mexican radio station and use its airwaves to broadcast Communist propaganda in the United States. The legislation would have closed loopholes in the FCC’s statutes that permitted Phoenix TV to operate in this manner.

“Today’s decision sends an important message to the world that the U.S. will not allow China to exploit FCC loopholes and spread its propaganda over our airwaves,” Cruz told the Free Beacon. “More importantly, this decision is a critical step in countering the Chinese Communist Party’s efforts to control what Americans see, hear, and ultimately think.”

The FCC ruling accuses XEWW-AM’s owners of trying to hide the station’s ties to Phoenix TV. The station’s license application, the FCC said, did not disclose Phoenix TV’s role in producing the station’s broadcasts. The license was rejected on this basis. While the station can resubmit its application at a later date, it is likely to be rejected due to mounting concerns about Phoenix TV’s distribution of Communist regime propaganda.

Cruz first raised concerns with the FCC in 2018, when the H&H Capital investment group purchased the Mexican station. H&H, Cruz said, is completely enmeshed in Phoenix TV’s operations. H&H is owned in large part by Vivian Huo, a U.S. citizen and Beijing native who formerly worked for several Chinese-run media outlets.

Meet the Law Firm(s) Representing Black Lives Matter

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It is important as a primer not to conflate ANTIFA with Black Lives Matter, although there is certainly video evidence that ANTIFA has allied with BLM in many situations. By the way, for your pleasure, here is the author of  The Anti-Fascist Handbook, Mr. Mark Bray.

ANTIFA does however receive grants from Soros and likely Tom Steyer.

 

Anyway, so the objective here is to concentrate on Black Lives Matter as the movement has become much more aggressive and radical.

George Floyd and Black Lives Matter Protests: Live Updates - The ... source NYT’s

Meet the National Lawyers Guild.

According to historian Harvey Klehr, the NLG was allied with the Communist Party; in the 1930s a significant number of NLG founders had been members or fellow travelers of the Communist Party USA,[14] including Riemer and Joseph Brodsky of the CP’s International Labor Defense auxiliary.[10] During the McCarthy era, the NLG was accused by Attorney General Herbert Brownell Jr. as well as the House Un-American Activities Committee of being a Communist front organization.[15]

In 1937, Allan R. Rosenberg joined the NLG and remained a member as a late as 1956 during his second appearance before HUAC.[16]

Page scan of sequence 227

And that same radical platform is here today.

The National Lawyers Guild DC Chapter is involved in progressive, radical, and left-wing struggles, causes, and movements right here in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. Legal observers and mass defense attorneys have assisted the Black Lives Matter movement, the Occupy DC protests, environmentalists opposed to area fracking and oil pipelines, immigrant rights activists, anti-war demonstrations, labor unionists and workers. The Chapter testified on behalf of marijuana legalization in D.C. and has launched a major investigation into mistreatment of prisoners at Virginia’s Red Onion State Prison.

Guild attorneys, legal workers, law students, and other members continue to collaborate in sharing experience and expertise in the form of working groups, study groups, and social groups. Chapter events like happy hours and the annual Disorientation workshop for law students at area law schools, provide an environment where progressive, radical, and left-wing attorneys can network, share experience, and pass on wisdom.

Guild members are defending activists, representing immigrants facing deportation, testifying in federal and state legislatures against civil liberties cutbacks. They are using their experience and professional skills to help build the 21st Century grassroots movements that are and will be necessary to protect civil liberties and to defend democracy now and in the future.

There are chapters across the country. When San Francisco elects Chesa Boudin to District Attorney when he is a member of the NLG, you must determine if the DA in your area is as well. You see, they have events where Chesa Boudin is a keynote speaker:

Progressive Law Day is a free day-long conference, organized and led by law student members of the National Lawyers Guild, San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, and open to legal workers, lawyers, activists, and anyone interested in learning about radical lawyering and legal work.

Radical is right, in fact it is referenced on several of their associated websites.

blair-anderson-lo-ferguson-oct NLG Legal Observer Blair Anderson at #FergusonOctober. (Photo: Cece McGuire)

The Mass Defense Committee (MDC) is a network of lawyers, legal workers and law students providing legal support for political activists, protesters and movements for social change.

MDC members in chapters across the country provide trainings, assistance in setting up temporary legal offices and legal support structures, and materials for supporting activists engaged in mass protests.

Mass Defense Support

The National Lawyers Guild can provide the following legal help to progressive organizations:

  • “Know your rights” trainings/workshops;
  • Meetings with, and advice to, organizers about protest actions, and legal consequences;
  • Legal Observers® at protests and other actions;
  • Help with setting up and running jail and bail support programs;
  • Legal representation in case of protest arrests.

Did you notice the item of legal observers? Well, the NLG does dispatch several observers to protests to not only advise but to capture video in or out of context at protest or demonstration events.

After training          _DSC1446  you can request observers….

Need to request Legal Observers?

Please email the Mass Defense Committee at [email protected]

Then there is the ubiquitous debate, rather attack on ICE.

WRITE LETTERS TO DETAINED FOLX VIA NEW ONLINE FORM — #FlattenICE Tuesdays

May 12, 2020

In addition to calling and tweeting at ICE to demand the release of individuals in detention, for which you can use this FlattenICE toolkit (bit.ly/flattenICE), you now can write letters — no stamps or envelopes needed — with this Google Form!

While acting to #FlattenICE, use this great sustainable call-ins graphic (thanks to Havannah and Hien from APSC, also on p. 8 of the FlattenICE toolkit) and remember to TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF.

Perhaps you are beginning to understand this all now right? Hold on there is yet another law firm you should know about.

But first we need to once again introduce Soros in the mix, of course. A nefarious division of his work is the Center for Popular Democracy. Got it? Okay, read on.

Trump demands Gov. Jay Inslee, Mayor Jenny Durkans 'take back' Seattle USAToday

There is this law firm known as Law for Black Lives. Law for Black Lives is a national community of radical lawyers and legal workers committed to transforming the law and building the power of organizing to defend, protect and advance Black Liberation across the globe. Now you know why the protests went world-wide, they are coordinated.

The Executive Director is Marbre Stahly-Butts.

Marbre Stahly-Butts is a former Soros Justice Fellow and now Policy Advocate at the Center for Popular Democracy. Her Soros Justice work focused on developing police reforms from the bottom up by organizing and working with families affected by aggressive policing practices in New York City. Stahly-Butts also works extensively on police and criminal justice reform with partners across the country. While in law school, Stahly-Butts focused on the intersection of criminal justice and civil rights, and gained legal experience with the Bronx Defenders, the Equal Justice Initiative, and the Prison Policy Initiative. Before law school Stahly-Butts worked in Zimbabwe organizing communities impacted by violence, and taught at Nelson Mandela’s alma mater in South Africa. Stahly-Butts is a city council designee to the Board appointed by Mayor Bill de Blasio.

***

Law for Black Lives and the Center for Constitutional Rights hosted a webinar on April 16th focused on the use of militarization, criminalization and surveillance during times of crisis. While many of us work tirelessly to support our families and communities, the Government is laying the groundwork to turn this health crisis into a criminalization crisis. We have already seen the DOJ request additional detainment powers, Congress funnel almost a billion dollars to local law enforcement agencies and cities across the country to use police to enforce stay at home orders. Join us for  a discussion about the current response. Panelists will provide insight about past abuses of power- from Katrina to 9/11. Together we will explore how lawyers and organizers have mobilized to mitigate the harms of criminalization and the way forward in this moment. If you missed the webinar, check out the recording below!

The rest is up to you to connect more of what you find. Perhaps since the United States fought wars to defeat communism, it may be prudent to demand the IRS terminate the non-profit status of the National Lawyers Guild as just a start and counter-measure.

Meanwhile of course, while Black Lives do Matter, the same goes for any life in America. One has to consider if the BLM movement is at the expense to all other races or classes and threat to civil society? Just take a long look at Seattle, Oakland or New York to answer that question. Maybe even the University of Miami Law School can shed some light on the subject. They teach a course.

In Spring of 2018, the School of Law will be convening an interdisciplinary course called “Race, Class, and Power: University Course on the #BlackLivesMatter Movement.”

The course will engage the multiple lenses through which the #BlackLivesMatter movement, and racial justice in the United States might be explored, including policing and criminal justice, comparative inquiry regarding race and identity, theories of social movements, education reform, cognitive psychology, healthcare and medicine, education and child welfare, incarceration and public health, literature and artistic expression, law and legal reform, environmental justice, and more.

Dear General Mattis and the other Flag Officers

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General Mattis, your op-ed in the Atlantic was repugnant. Let’s review what you purposely overlooked, shall we?

photo

 

Know your Terrain

It’s the leader’s job to interpret and translate the terrain and operating environment. Know whether you are the bear or the alligator. Leaders must understand their organization’s strengths, weaknesses, and ideal operating terrain before stepping into the fight. There is no “unfair” when dealing with an uncontrollable variable like terrain. Read more here from Sun Tzu on terrain.

You see during the Covid-19 lockdown, America was in fear. The fear doubled and confidence has been shattered with rioting, death, arson and looting. General, you did not offer a solution. But we are learning all the dynamics of the changing terrain in America and it is ugly.

All Enemies Foreign and Domestic

Our rights as citizens are to be protected and the elite members of our Praetorian Guard are designated as politicians at all levels, law enforcement and the branches of the military. So to you Generals and Admirals, to the politicians and law enforcement, who is protecting selected voices from censorship? What about illegal searches and surveillance where we are to be secure in our person, papers and effects? What about our ability to fully protect ourselves from home invasions or burning a building or business where the upper floors are actually apartments? We have gangs operating all over the nation, we have subversive groups doing the same. We have an insurgency upon the country and they are domestic enemies to the general welfare of America. What is your solution if not law and order?

Ungoverned Spaces

You are well aware of places like Idlib, Syria, the Sahel, Libya, Donbass, Ukraine, even the South China Sea and the Strait of Hormuz. General, in America there are thousands of points of ungoverned spaces including public schools, streets in San Francisco, the courthouse steps in Portland, Oregon or the college campus at Berkeley. In recent days, ungoverned spaces included cities and streets across the nation where police are told to take a light touch all while mayors have released violent criminals from prison and what would be felony arrests are considered misdemeanors, letting go the criminal within hours with a mere $120 ticket. General, have you considered this chaos? Are you applying strategic thinking to frontier justice where decent Americans will be forced into vigilante justice? Syrians were forced into that just as Libyans are. We have to fend for ourselves, you omitted that part. So, to you Flag officers, have you a solution war plan to solve this in America?

Domestic Tranquility

While the intent of the Framers intended to quell uprisings and rebellions between states, domestic tranquility is fleeting. When civil society is challenged and criminal behavior goes unpunished, established justice is broken. Peaceful demonstrations are events where the demonstrators put forth their grievances. That is a wonderful and endorsed right. When riots, theft, looting, arson, shootings or otherwise physical harm comes to person or property, law and order is fractured. Placing the National Guard at designated locations is to augment law enforcement. If that fails, a higher more assertive remedy is called for including the consideration of the Insurrection Act. There is not a respectable American that wants conditions to reach that point and that includes President Trump. But just like military personnel in the realm of war-gaming operations, all consideration must be on the desk and they are. In the case of the civilian population, leaders and law enforcement too must consider all options for the protection of public safety.

So General Mattis, you are quoted as saying ‘ If you cannot create harmony, even vicious harmony on the battlefield based on trust across service lines, across service lines, across coalition and national lines and across civilian/military lines, you need to go home, because your leadership is obsolete‘.

That harmony you speak of is lost in America, we are divided. So, General sir…just go home, take the other Flag officers with you.

We are gonna be ‘polite and professional’ in spite of it all, but we are gonna be the guards of our own terrain, personally and professionally and politely.