Category Archives: Department of Homeland Security

Supply Chain Crisis and Where is the Defense Production Act?

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What is the Defense Production Act?

The Defense Production Act is the primary source of presidential authorities to expedite and expand the supply of materials and services from the U.S. industrial base needed to promote the national defense. DPA authorities are available to support: emergency preparedness activities conducted pursuant to title VI of the Stafford Act; protection or restoration of critical infrastructure; and efforts to prevent, reduce vulnerability to, minimize damage from, and recover from acts of terrorism within the United States. DPA authorities may be used to:

  • Require acceptance and preferential performance of contracts and orders under DPA Title I. (See Federal Priorities and Allocations System (FPAS).)
  • Provide financial incentives and assistance (under DPA Title III) for U.S. industry to expand productive capacity and supply needed for national defense purposes;
  • Provide antitrust protection (through DPA voluntary agreements in DPA Title VII) for businesses to cooperate in planning and operations for national defense purposes, including homeland security.

But national security? Yes. We remain the midst of the Covid 19 pandemic and those affected could and often are our protectors, not only medically but when it comes to legally or militarily.

While we are fretting over shortages and necessities in our daily lives there are two real areas of major concern, they are medicines and micro-chips (semiconductors) used for advanced technology of many varieties.

China Is Getting Ready to Take On the World's Biggest ...

Basic medicines in use either by prescription or over the counter are manufactured in Asia, mostly China that is. It is a fact we learned in the early days of the pandemic. Imagine now that we are faced with a shortage of antibiotics, insulin, aspirin or Lasix and Dyazide. Could we once again face personal protection equipment shortages?

DOD Announces $74.9 Million in Defense Production Act ...

When it comes to semiconductors, the following is important to know:

In part from a senate committee: To mitigate supply chain risks and ensure that semiconductors used in sensitive military systems do not have malware embedded in them, in 2004 the Department of Defense established the “Trusted Foundry Program.” Under this program the government identifies companies deemed secure and trustworthy enough to produce chips exclusively for the military. Two facilities currently operate under this program, one in Vermont and one in New York.

The program only produces a small percentage of the nearly 2 billion semiconductors DOD acquires each year. Some observers have expressed concern that the trusted foundries are falling behind technologically compared to commercial fabrication facilities in East Asia. This could leave the U.S. military at a technological disadvantage to China and other countries that buy superior chips.

In 2017, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency launched the Electronics Resurgence Initiative, which seeks to address market and technological trends and challenges in the microelectronics sector.

Sounds shaky right? It is as we need results and we need them now. So where is that order by the Biden administration for the Defense Production Act which would jump start real action in all the various reasons for the log jam at ports around the United States? There is no one single reason for the cargo ships being stacked up in Long Beach, Los Angeles, Port Houston, Savannah to name a few.

The United States can relieve the cargo pressures immediately by deploying the National Guard, signing waivers on regulations and by stopping all the financial payments that encourage people to simply not go to work.


The BBC reports in part: 

The shortages hitting countries around the world

A “perfect storm” in China is hitting shoppers and businesses at home and overseas.

It is affecting everything from paper, food, textiles and toys to iPhone chips, says Dr Michal Meidan from the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies.

She says these items “may end up being in short supply this Christmas”.

Then there is the Department of Transportation and the Secretary has been absent….his involvement in this?

Maritime administration –>

U.S. maritime ports are critical links in the U.S. domestic and international trade supply-chain.  Ports serve as centers of commerce where freight and commodities are transferred between cargo ships, barges, trucks, trains, and pipelines.

The Port Infrastructure Development Program supports the efficient movement of commerce upon which our economy relies through discretionary grant funding that helps strengthen, modernize, and improve our country’s maritime systems and gateway ports. Grants are awarded on a competitive basis and support the Nation’s long-term economic vitality.

Port Infrastructure Development grants provide planning, operational and capital financing, and project management assistance to improve port capacity and operations.

Authorization History

The Port Infrastructure and Development Program was authorized by Congress as part of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 (Public Law 111-84). The legislation states that “The Secretary of Transportation, through the Maritime Administrator, shall establish a port infrastructure development program for the improvement of port facilities.”

The law specifically authorizes the Administrator to:

  1. Receive funds provided for the project from Federal, non-Federal, and private entities that have a specific agreement or contract with the Administrator to further the purposes of this subsection;
  2. Coordinate with other Federal agencies to expedite the process established under the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.) for the improvement of port facilities to improve the efficiency of the transportation system, to increase port security, or to provide greater access to port facilities;
  3. Seek to coordinate all reviews or requirements with appropriate local, State, and Federal agencies; and
  4. Provide such technical assistance and financial assistance, including grants, to port authorities or commissions or their subdivisions and agents as needed for project planning, design, and construction.

The authorizing legislation also established a Port Infrastructure Development Fund for use by the Administrator in carrying out projects under the program. The fund is available for the Administrator to:

  1. Administer and carry out projects under the program;
  2. Receive Federal, non-Federal, and private funds from entities which have specific agreements or contracts with the Administrator; and
  3. Make refunds for projects that will not be completed.

There are also additional legislative provisions for the crediting and transfer of monies into the fund.

 

Details of the Parole Status of Illegals in the Biden Administration

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Primer: The Biden Administration is legislating ignoring Congress.

What is Parole? 

 

FNC:

EXCLUSIVE: At least 160,000 illegal immigrants have been released into the U.S., often with little to no supervision, by the Biden administration since March – including a broad use of limited parole authorities to make more than 30,000 eligible for work permits since August, Border Patrol documents obtained by Fox News show.

The documents give a partial snapshot into how the Biden administration has been releasing enormous numbers of migrants into the U.S., often with little to no oversight, supervision or immediate risk of deportation.

Since March 20, at least 94,570 illegal immigrants have been released into the U.S. with Notices to Report. Those who receive such a notice are only required to check in with an ICE office when they get to their final destination – which could be anywhere across the country. Those who check in are not deported or detained as their immigration proceedings move forward.

Meanwhile, since Aug 6th, the administration has released roughly 32,000 immigrants into the U.S. via parole – which gives migrants a form of legal status and the ability to apply for work permits.

Federal law says parole authority is to be used on a case-by-case basis for “urgent humanitarian purposes” and “significant public benefit.” Typically only a handful of parole cases are granted by officials, but the Biden administration has been using it more broadly, including in its parole of tens of thousands of Afghans into the United States as part of Operation Allies Welcome.

Former Border Patrol Chief Rodney Scott, who served under President Biden, reviewed the documents and told Fox News that he believes the administration is abusing its parole authority.

“By law and regulation a parole shall only be granted on a case by case basis and only for significant humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit. Neither of these appear to apply to the current situation,” he said, adding that the number of paroles brings into question the review and approval process.

“As a field chief, I don’t believe I ever approved more than 5 or 10 paroles in a year,” he said. “When I did, I ensured that the alien was monitored continuously and was detained or removed as soon as the circumstances allowed.”

The documents also show that since Aug 6, the administration has released an additional 40,000 illegal immigrants on their own recognizance. The documents also show that on one single day in Del Rio sector, 128 single adult illegal immigrants were released into the U.S. without ATD – which typically includes tracking by an ankle monitor or phone.

Texas braces for the arrival of 60,000 migrants at the borderVideo

A Customs and Border Protection (CBP) official told Fox that mechanisms like paroling, the use of NTRs and enrolling migrants in Alternatives to Detention (ATD) “provides mechanisms to require family units released from CBP custody to report to ICE within a specified time.”

The official also cited figures that show that between 2014 and 2020, 81% of those released into the U.S. did report in for their immigration proceedings.

The agency has not released its numbers for September, but in both July and August there were more than 200,000 migrant encounters, marking some of the highest numbers in two decades. Since then, migrants have kept coming in large numbers. According to the documents, Rio Grande Valley encountered 5,900 migrants in one week, while Del Rio encountered more than 2,900 in the same period.

DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who has repeatedly claimed that the border is not open, reportedly warned officials of a worst case scenario of up to 400,000 encounters if Title 42 public health protections were ended.

Republicans have blamed the Biden administration’s rapid rollback of Trump-era border protections for the ongoing crisis at the border. The administration however has focused on an explanation emphasizing “root causes” like poverty, corruption and violence in Central America.

“The downturn in economies, the attendant rise in violence, the downturn in economies made more acute by reason of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the suppression of any humanitarian relief over the past number of years, and the pent-up thirst for relief among many different populations,” Mayorkas told Yahoo News this week. “I think an accumulation of factors contributes to the rise in migration that we’ve seen.”

DOJ Considering Parents vs. School Boards as Terrorists

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The National School Boards Association wrote a 6 page letter to President Biden. The full letter is here. In part:

As these threats and acts of violence have become more prevalent – during public
school board meetings, via documented threats transmitted through the U.S. Postal Service, through
social media and other online platforms, and around personal properties – NSBA respectfully asks
that a joint collaboration among federal law enforcement agencies, state and local law enforcement,
and with public school officials be undertaken to focus on these threats. NSBA specifically solicits
the expertise and resources of the U.S. Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI),
U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Secret Service, and its National Threat Assessment
Center regarding the level of risk to public schoolchildren, educators, board members, and
facilities/campuses. We also request the assistance of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service to intervene
against threatening letters and cyberbullying attacks that have been transmitted to students, school
board members, district administrators, and other educators.

As these acts of malice, violence, and threats against public school officials have increased, the
classification of these heinous actions could be the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and
hate crimes. As such, NSBA requests a joint expedited review by the U.S. Departments of Justice,
Education, and Homeland Security, along with the appropriate training, coordination,
investigations, and enforcement mechanisms from the FBI, including any technical assistance
necessary from, and state and local coordination with, its National Security Branch and
Counterterrorism Division, as well as any other federal agency with relevant jurisdictional authority
and oversight. Additionally, NSBA requests that such review examine appropriate enforceable
actions against these crimes and acts of violence under the Gun–Free School Zones Act, the
PATRIOT Act in regards to domestic terrorism, the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate
Crimes Prevention Act, the Violent Interference with Federally Protected Rights statute, the
Conspiracy Against Rights statute, an Executive Order to enforce all applicable federal laws for the(…)

UPDATE: Cape school board meeting ends in protest | Cape Gazette

In another part of the letter:

These threats or actual acts of violence against our school districts are impacting the delivery of
educational services to students and families, as many districts receive federal funds and subsidies
for services to millions of students with disabilities, health screenings and supplemental supports for
disadvantaged students, child nutrition, broadband connectivity, educator development, school
safety activities, career and technical education, and more. School board meetings have been
disrupted in California, Florida, Georgia, and other states because of local directives for mask
coverings to protect students and educators from COVID–19.

An individual was arrested in Illinois for aggravated battery and disorderly conduct during a school
board meeting. During two separate school board meetings in Michigan9, an individual yelled a
Nazi salute in protest to masking requirements, and another individual prompted the board to call
a recess because of opposition to critical race theory.

Virginia's Loudoun County School Board silences public comment after raucous meeting, 2 men arrested | Fox News

Who do you think will win in this battle? Just a few days ago in a debate of candidates for the governors race in Virginia, Terry McAuliffe –>

Terry McAuliffe and Glenn Youngkin sparred during the second and final debate of Virginia’s governor’s race on Tuesday, but it was one comment on schools by McAuliffe, the Democratic candidate, that drew the ire of conservatives. 

“I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach,” McAuliffe, who previously served as governor of Virginia from 2014 to 2018, said during the debate in Alexandria, Virginia.

McAuliffe made the remarks in response to Youngkin, the Republican candidate, who argued that parents should be more involved in the decisions of local school districts. Conservative social media responded. 

Just how long before the public school systems across the country collapse and homeowners challenge in court their property tax dollars that pay for the public school systems and teachers? The Biden administration is fully devoted to unions and will continue to side with the teacher’s unions as has already been proven with regard to financial bailouts and masks mandates.

Take caution parents, this is a tailspin that has no end until the parents declare an end to the entire corrupt system.

 

Useful Details/Laws about the Migrant Chaos at the Southern Border

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As a primer:

America’s Founders were concerned about invasion. It was mentioned it four times in the Constitution, though the term was never explicitly defined.

Article I, Section 8, Paragraph 15: The Congress shall have the Power (to) provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

Article I, Section 9, Paragraph 2: The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.

Article I, Section 10, Paragraph 3: No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.

Article IV, Section 4, Paragraph 1: The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestics Violence.

So, as Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Mayorkas admits at least 13,000 Haitians were admitted into the United States to clear Del Rio, no one can deny this is an invasion. Further, that number only refers to those under that bridge in Del Rio, it does not include the 1.2 million that already passed into the United States or the unknown number of ‘gotaways’. Miles and miles of other parts of the Southern border goes unprotected or managed due to the overwhelming volume.

In June of 2021, Congressman Jody Arrington (R-TX) introduced legislation that further explains the lawlessness that Congress must address.

H.J.Res.50 – Recognizing that Article I, Section 10 of the United States Constitution explicitly reserves to the States the sovereign power to repel an invasion and defend their citizenry from the overwhelming and “imminent danger” posed by paramilitary, narco-terrorist cartels who have seized control of our southern border.

Read the proposed legislation here. 

Of course under Speaker Nancy Pelosi there will be no movement to this legislation or others in the pipeline.

Even more crazy is the fact that the Haitians were already given residency status in several countries in Latin America going back to as far as 2010, directly after the earthquake.

After the earthquake of 2010, thousands of Haitians began migration to the country, in hopes of finding a new life. According to Atlanta Blackstar, the United Nations reported “an unprecedented number of people displaced from their homes—one in 113 people in the world—migration and asylum has once again come under the spotlight.”

In 2015, the Brazilian government granted residency to almost 44, 000 Haitians. source

Haitians Flee To Brazil To Escape Getty Images

In part from an NBC affiliate: Most of the Haitians already had refugee status in Chile or Brazil but were not seeking the same from Mexico, according to Mexico’s foreign relations secretary, Marcelo Ebrard. “What they are asking for is to be allowed to pass freely through Mexico to the United States,” Ebrard said in an interview with The Associated Press.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued a stark warning during a news conference Monday. “If you come to the United States illegally, you will be returned, your journey will not succeed, and you will be endangering your life and your family’s life,” he said. The DHS says some who are being released are given legal documents summoning them to a court date.

“Individuals who are not immediately repatriated are either placed in Alternatives to Detention, detained in an ICE facility, or released with a legal document (either a Notice to Appear in court or a notice to report to an ICE office for further immigration processing),” DHS spokesman Eduardo Maia Silva told Sinclair Broadcast Group in an emailed statement. (this obviously has turned out to be a lie)

 

 

.

“The reason Haitian migrants discard their Chilean and Brazilian ID cards over here on the Mex side is to obscure from asylum reviewers that they were already safely and prosperously situated for years and years before coming for the American upgrades,” explained Bensman.

Fox News journalist Bill Melugin also published photographs of documents discarded by the migrants, and among the findings, he discovered that some of them had already been processed by the United States.

 

It should be recalled that according to the Daily Mail, a recent report by the DHS Office of Inspector General found that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) does not have the resources to assess the health of migrants entering its custody and relies on public health systems in surrounding cities to do so.

“Without stronger COVID-19 prevention measures in place, DHS is putting its workforce, support staff, communities, and migrants at greater risk of contracting the virus,” wrote the DHS Office of Inspector General. source

Now back to that pesky Constitution…right? Not for anyone part of the Biden administration.

Was it Eco-Health, NIH or Wuhan and the Money that Killed so Many?

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The US-based, non-profit research group EcoHealth Alliance in 2014 received a US$3.1 million, five-year NIH grant to understand the risk of a novel bat virus spilling into humans in China, as had happened in the Sars outbreak in 2002.

“It would have been irresponsible of us if we did not investigate the bat viruses and the serology to see who might have been infected in China,” Fauci, whose institute was responsible for the grant, testified at a congressional hearing in May.

Research was undertaken in partnership with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, with a budget of between US$120,000 and US$150,000 a year under the grant, according to documents released by The Intercept.

Part of the work included exploring whether newly discovered bat viruses had the potential to infect people, and it is this aspect of the research which has come under scrutiny.

Wei Jingsheng, in a new report about his upcoming book called “What happened in Wuhan,” stated that he first heard about the Coronavirus at the World Military Games in Wuhan in October 2019. source

Chinese defector Wei Jingsheng tried to warn US officials.

source

Alerted by the news, he returned to the US and notified the CIA and FBI about what he had heard. The Agencies already knew him because he defected to the United States back in 1997 after leaving the Chinese communist party. Mr. Jingsheng said that he also alerted US politicians with connections to Trump and then alerted the Chinese human rights activist Dimon Liu.

Mr. Wei said that he found out more about the virus from one of his contacts in Beijing. He also noted that through Chinese activist Dimon Liu he spoke to politicians in the house about the dangers of the outbreak and that he also expressed his concerns to people in the Trump white house in 2019.
Wei said he would not reveal what politicians with ties to Trump he spoke with but states that the politicians could have reached the President immediately.

Chinese Human rights activist Demon Liu revealed that Mr. Lei told her about the virus at a dinner with her husband, a retired CIA agent, on November 22, 2019.
Liu said in a statement, “I couldn’t quite believe what he was saying,” Liu went on to say. “At that time, I had thought that the Coronavirus could not be worse than SARS. And SARS, as we knew from experience, was not that contagious, and it could be contained. I thought at the time that was the case. Okay, there was an outbreak, but the authorities and the advance of medical sciences would be able to contain the spread of it.”
Liu states that she wanted to pass the information that Mr. Wei gave her to Trump’s deputy National security advisor Matt Pottinger but decided against it because, as she puts it – “I didn’t send it to him because so many things were so incredulous,” she said. “I wrote it, but I didn’t send it because I decided it was better if Wei talks directly to Matt Pottinger.”

China hits back at Wuhan lab leak 'conspiracy' after Biden ...

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KEY POINTS

  •  27 scientist published a letter in The Lancet last March denouncing lab-leak theories.
  • 26 of the 27 scientists have ties to Wuhan Institute funders or researchers.
  • Lead scientist says letter was written for “our collaborators” in China for a “show of support.”

In March of last year, 27 scientists wrote a letter to medical journal The Lancet denouncing claims that COVID-19 could have originated in a lab. It’s now been revealed that 26 of those 27 scientists have ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology – that’s what we call a conflict of interest.

In The Lancet letter, the scientists stated, “We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that Covid-19 does not have a natural origin.” But, according to the Daily Mail, “The orchestrator of the letter, British zoologist Peter Daszak, [had] a conflict of interest through him being president of the US-based EcoHealth Alliance, which has funded research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”

Additionally, the Telegraph is reporting that a February 8th email released under an FOIA request reveals Mr. Daszak wrote The Lancet letter after being asked by “our collaborators” in China for a “show of support.”

That tanks Mr. Daszak’s credibility – and the other scientists don’t fare much better.

“Other signatories…include Prof Kanta Subbarao, who spoke at a conference in Wuhan – part organised by the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Dr John Mackenzie, of Curtin University of Technology in Australia, [also] put his name to the letter, but failed to mention he was still listed as a committee member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of Centre for Emerging Infectious Diseases at the Wuhan Institute of Virology,” the Telegraph reports.

The list goes on and on until…

“Dr Ronald Corley, a microbiology expert from Boston University – has been found to have no links back to funders or researchers at the Wuhan institute,” according to the Daily Mail.

When all is said and done, 26 of the 27 Lancet letter scientists have ties to funders or researchers at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Even members of the scientific community don’t believe Daszak & Co. wrote the article in good faith.

“I was a little perplexed and a little bit upset with five very good scientists, some of whom I know well, who I thought stepped way out beyond what they should have been saying, based on the data available to all of us,” said David Welman, a professor who advises the U.S. government on biological threats and risks.

“These were not scientific papers, they did not present scientific evidence, they did not analyse and support scientific data, they were presenting opinion, they did not belong in scientific journals,” said Richard Ebrigh, chemistry professor at Rutgers University.

Since its publishing, the Lancet letter has been instrumental in slapping down lab-leak “conspiracy theorists.” Now, it won’t be so easy.