Top Issue for America: Terrorism or the Economy?

Posted on December 14, 2015December 14, 2015 by Denise Simon

Obama has willingly ignored the global terror threat matrix telling the world that climate change is a major threat.

In part USAToday: President Obama is sticking with his view that climate change is a global threat on the order of terrorism, in part because terrorist groups like the Islamic State will be defeated in traditional ways.

“But If you start seeing the oceans rise by five, six, seven feet” and if weather patterns change to where “bread baskets to the world suddenly can no longer grow food, then you’re seeing the kind of crisis that we can’t deal with through the deployment of the Marines,” Obama said in an interview on CBS This Morning.

“We can’t deal with it through pouring money at it,” Obama added.

As for terrorism, Obama — who is seeking a global climate change agreement — said “we’re gonna get” the Islamic State.

“They will be defeated,” Obama said. “There will be ongoing efforts to disrupt the world order from terrorists, from rogue states, from cyber attacks. There’s always some bad people out there trying to do bad things. And we have to be vigilant in going after them.”

Americans Name Terrorism as Top Problem for US

Nearly one in six say so, the highest figure in a decade

FreeBeacon: Americans are most likely to name terrorism as the top problem facing the United States in the wake of the terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California.

Sixteen percent of Americans name terrorism as the largest problem for the country, more than a fivefold increase over the 3 percent who said so in early November before coordinated shootings and suicide bombings killed 130 people in Paris, according to a Gallup poll released Monday.

Terrorism ranks as a higher concern than the government, which 13 percent of U.S. adults name as the top issue facing the country. Americans are also more likely to point to terrorism as the largest issue than they are the economy (9 percent) and guns (7 percent).

The share of Americans labeling terrorism the primary issue is at its highest level in a decade, though remains far below the 46 percent who said so following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

The poll also found that, though Republicans are more likely than Democrats to name terrorism as today’s biggest issue, Americans identifying with both political parties are much more likely to mention terrorism as the top problem today than they were one month ago.

Currently, nearly a quarter of Republicans name terrorism the primary issue, six times the share who did so in early November. The percentage of Democrats has tripled in one month to 9 percent, and the share of independents has jumped more than sevenfold to 15 percent.

The poll was conducted in the days following the deadly shooting at a San Bernardino office party that killed 14 people and wounded more than 20 others. The two attackers, who later died in a shootout with police, had both been radicalized for years. Both were also allegedly supporters of ISIS, the terrorist group that claimed responsibility for the attacks in Paris on November 13.

In addition to naming terrorism the top issue, Americans are also decreasingly confident in the U.S. government’s ability to protect the nation from terrorist attacks in the future, according to previously released Gallup polling. A new low of 55 percent have at least a fair amount of confidence in the government under President Obama to protect the country against terrorism, a number that has eroded 12 percentage points since June.

Americans are particularly dissatisfied with the way in which Obama has been handling ISIS, with a majority of 64 percent disapproving of the way in which the president has responded to the terror group, according to a CNN/ORC survey released last week. Majorities of both Republicans and Democrats do not believe that the U.S. military response to the terrorists has been aggressive enough.

Though a majority of adults now want the U.S. to send ground troops into combat operations against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, the Obama administration has argued that doing so is not the answer to defeating the terror group.

“While we certainly have the capability to furnish a U.S. component to such a ground force, we have not recommended this course of action for several reasons,” Defense Secretary Ash Carter told lawmakers Wednesday. “In the near term, it would be a significant undertaking that, much as we may wish otherwise, realistically, we would embark upon largely by ourselves; and it would be ceding our comparative advantage of special forces, mobility, and firepower, instead fighting on the enemy’s terms.”

“In the medium-term, by seeming to Americanize the conflicts in Iraq and Syria, we could well turn those fighting [ISIS] or inclined to resist their rule into fighting us instead,” Carter added.

Hillary’s Campaign Connect to Turkey’s Gulen

Posted on December 12, 2015December 19, 2015 by Denise Simon

Sheesh, this moderate Muslim thing in the United States has taken on additional wings of disgust and Hillary’s name continues to be in the equation….often.

It was December of 2014, that this site, FoundersCode wrote about the Gulen schools in America and some have been investigated by the FBI and closed.

Islamic Cleric May Be Laundering Taxpayer Money Into Clinton Campaign — Hillary Under Pressure To Return Donations

DailyCaller: A mysterious Turkish Islamic cleric — whose followers have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Hillary Clinton’s family foundation and to her presidential campaign — is being accused of ordering the false imprisonment of three followers of a competing religious sect, according to documents filed in federal court earlier this week.

The cleric, Fethullah Gulen, has lived in Pennsylvania’s Pocono mountains since 1998, when he went into exile from Turkey amid accusations that he plotted to undermine the secular regime that was in place at the time.

But the 74-year-old has been able to wield control from that that secluded compound over his worldwide network of media organizations and charter schools — some 120 of which are in the U.S.

Gulen also maintains enormous power in Turkey, where he uses his strong following to quash political opponents, according to Robert Amsterdam, an attorney hired by the Turkish government to investigate Gulen.

Gulen and Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, were once allies against the nation’s secular regime. But the pair fell out publicly after a 2013 corruption investigation targeting Erdogan’s inner circle. The politician accused the cleric of coordinating the campaign. In turn, he’s reportedly asked President Obama to extradite Gulen to face charges back home.

It was against that backdrop that Amsterdam laid out during a press conference on Wednesday the claims made in a lawsuit against Gulen.

In the suit, three followers of the Dogan movement, which follows the interpretations of Mehmet Dogan and Said Nursi, claim Gulen ordered their arrest because they criticized the Gulen movement, also known as Hizmet. They also claimed that Gulenists planted false evidence to build the case against them.

According to the suit, Gulen’s alleged “targeted campaign of persecution” violates U.S. law.

But Amsterdam also laid out evidence against Gulen that lies closer to home, claiming that whistleblowers have come forward to shed light on how taxpayer-funded Gulen charter schools in the U.S. are operated.

He said that the whistleblowers have claimed that teachers proselytize to American students about the Gulen movement, which is considered to espouse a moderate form of Islam. He also said that teachers in those schools have claimed that Turkish teachers are given bonuses based on their indoctrination efforts. The ultimate reward is a trip to Gulen’s Pocono compound, Amsterdam claimed.

He also pointed to investigations conducted in several states and by the FBI which have found that the Gulen movement relies heavily on the H-1B visa system to fill its schools with Turkish teachers.

As Amsterdam noted Wednesday, in 2009, Gulen charter schools received more H-1B visas than Google, the massive tech company. He also pointed to audits conducted in some locales which showed that some of the taxpayer-funded Gulen schools have paid more for immigration attorneys for their Turkish teachers than they have for books.

“This is where American taxpayer money is going,” Amsterdam asserted, adding that “clearly, the United States didn’t need anything like that level of teachers.”

In turn, the teachers — largely males who often know little English — donate a large portion of their taxpayer-funded salaries to the Gulen movement.

And those funds are used, in part, to make the U.S. arm of the Gulen movement one of the “largest foreign interveners in American political activity,” Amsterdam claimed.

And perhaps the biggest beneficiary of those political funds is Clinton, the Democratic presidential frontrunner.

As The Daily Caller reported last month, Gulenists have contributed heavily to Clinton’s presidential campaign and to the Clinton Foundation. (RELATED: Followers Of A Mysterious Islamic Cleric Have Donated Heavily To Hillary’s Foundation And Campaign)

Recep Ozkan, a businessman who has served as president of the Gulen-affiliated Turkish Cultural Center, contributed as much as $1 million to Clinton’s global charity in the third quarter of 2015. The Gulenist leader also contributed the maximum amount allowed under federal law to Clinton’s presidential campaign. He and another Gulen leader, Gokhan Ozkok, served as national finance co-chairs for Ready PAC, a political action committee created last year to support Clinton, TheDC found.

As a senator from New York, Clinton attended at least two functions at the Turkish Cultural Center.

The suspicious sourcing of the Gulenists’ contributions should compel Clinton to return them, Amsterdam told TheDC.

“Mr. Gulen has used his religious movement and network of charter schools to support political donations to Secretary Clinton and other politicians to build political support in the U.S. — support he uses to expand his massive charter school operation and attack the elected Government of Turkey,” Amsterdam said, adding that the donations are, “in part, taken from the salaries of teachers on H-1B visas.”

“The Clinton campaign and any other recipient of Gulen-linked donations should consider returning these funds as Senator Ayotte did.”

Last month, Ayotte, a New Hampshire Republican, returned more than $43,000 in contributions given to her campaign by Gulenists in April 2014. As USA Today reported at the time, many of the contributors appeared not to have known who was receiving their contributions. Others could not be tracked down, raising suspicion over whether the payouts were legitimate.

Ayotte called on Clinton to follow her lead in returning contributions her campaign has received from Gulenists. The Clinton campaign has not responded to requests for comment.

The Black Flag of ISIS Bound for Rome

Posted on December 12, 2015December 12, 2015 by Denise Simon

WATCH: Islamic State presents its version of the apocalypse

Video shows jihadist group’s fighters preparing to conquer Rome, destroy St. Peter’s Basilica

ToI: A recently released video by the Islamic State presents the jihadist group’s version of the apocalypse, with its fighters preparing to conquer Rome.

As is now the norm with the group’s videos, the clip is slick and professionally produced. It shows jihadists making final preparations for battle alternating with shots of “Rome” – a symbolic representation of the powerhouse of Christianity — in images of St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican and the ruins of the Roman Colosseum. Tanks supposed to be advancing to the Italian capital are seen flying IS flags as they leave tracks in the desert.

Curiously, the end of times-obsessed terror organization’s clip shows the apocalypse not as it is described in the writings of Islam, but rather more in keeping with western, Christian fantasies.

At one point, the video shows flags of some 60 countries with which Islamic State sees itself as being at war, among them Britain, France, Australia and the US. Other sections of the video depict fighters wearing suicide vests or marching toward Europe.

The video was released several weeks after the deadly Paris terror attacks in which 130 people were killed, and for which IS claimed responsibility. A more recent shooting in San Bernardino, California was carried out by a couple who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State but were not directly following a command from the group’s top echelon in Syria.

While viewing this video, what terrifying conditions do you see?

More Hillary Emails are Missing Regarding her Server

Posted on December 12, 2015December 12, 2015 by Denise Simon

State Department can’t find emails of top Clinton IT staffer

The FBI has taken possession of Bryan Pagliano’s computer system.

Politico: The State Department has told Senate investigators it cannot find backup copies of emails sent by Bryan Pagliano, the top Hillary Clinton IT staffer who maintained her email server but has asserted his Fifth Amendment right and refused to answer questions on the matter.

State officials told the Senate Judiciary Committee in a recent closed-door meeting that they could not locate what’s known as a “.pst file” for Pagliano’s work during Clinton’s tenure, which would have included copies of the tech expert’s emails, according to a letter Chairman Chuck Grassley sent to Secretary of State John Kerry that was obtained by POLITICO.

The department also told the committee the FBI has taken possession of Pagliano’s government computer system, where traces of the messages are most likely to be found, according to the letter.

Grassley, an Iowa Republican, has been considering whether to grant Pagliano immunity in exchange for testimony on who approved Clinton’s private email setup and whether anyone raised any objections to the system. The controversy over her decision to bypass a government email address, which would have made her messages easier for reporters and the public to obtain, has dogged the presidential hopeful for much of the year, though it has subsided in recent weeks.

Pagliano — who worked for Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, then followed her to the State Department — has refused to discuss Clinton’s email arrangement or his role in it, invoking his right against self-incrimination before the House Benghazi Committee earlier this fall.

Clinton had personally paid Pagliano to maintain her home-made server, which is also currently in the FBI’s possession. The agency has been investigating whether classified material was ever put at risk because she used her own server instead of the standard State email system. The State Department has designated about 1,000 of her emails as classified documents, which would never have been allowed on such a private system. Clinton’s representatives maintain that the emails were not classified at the time they were sent.

Pagliano’s lawyer could not be reached for comment.

Grassley had requested Pagliano’s emails to help inform his decision whether to grant Pagliano immunity.

“Given that the committee is unable to obtain [Pagliano’s] testimony at this time, I am seeking copies of his official State Department emails relevant to the Committee’s inquiry before proceeding to consider whether it might be appropriate to grant him immunity and compel his testimony,” Grassley’s letter states. It notes that such emails are a “top priority” in a list of several outstanding Clinton-related inquiries the panel has sent to the department.

The State Department said that while it has located a backup for emails Pagliano sent after Clinton left State, officials cannot find the file for the backup covering work he did while she was still there.

“The Department has located a .pst from Mr. Pagliano’s recent work at the Department as a contractor, but the files are from after Secretary Clinton left the State Department. We have not yet located a .pst that covers the time period of Secretary Clinton’s tenure,” said Alec Gerlach, a State Department spokesman. “We are continuing to search for Mr. Pagliano’s emails which the Department may have otherwise retained. We will, of course, share emails responsive to Senator Grassley’s requests if we locate them.”

State, like many federal agencies, did not have a systematic email archiving system for years. When the server issue first arose in the spring, State acknowledged that it did not automatically archive the email traffic of senior employees — relying on them to make their own backups, or “.pst,” if needed. Under current rules, federal employees are responsible for ensuring their official emails are saved.

State has not asked Pagliano whether he has any official emails in his possession, as it has with other top Clinton staffers who used personal email for work. It is unclear if Pagliano’s Fifth Amendment rights would protect him from turning over such messages.

Grassley encouraged State to continue searching for Pagliano’s emails by looking at the back-up email files of other State employees he may have emailed about the Clinton server. He letter seeks “a full and detailed written explanation of why it failed to maintain an archive, copy, or backup of Mr. Pagliano’s email file,” among other requests related to the IT staffer’s emails.

While State hasn’t been able to meet Grassley’s requests so far, his letter did offer some rare praise for the department, commending Kerry and State for what Grassley called a “recent increase in cooperation and focus on the committee’s request.” The letter says Judiciary has prioritized 22 requests for information and received seven “fully complete responses” and nine “partially complete responses.”

And State, which has been bombarded by inquiries about Clinton’s email setup, seems to appreciate the recognition: “As Senator Grassley noted, the State Department has been working very closely with his staff to get him the requested information and documents, and we are making progress,” Gerlach added.

Grassley had been blocking the confirmation of about 20 of State’s Foreign Service nominees because the department hadn’t fulfilled various document requests, including those for another probe he’s conducting on the dual-employment status of top Clinton adviser Huma Abedin. Abedin advised Clinton while she was also working for a consulting company; Grassley has been asking for information about the arrangement since 2013.

Given State’s recent responsiveness, however, he recently dropped the 20 holds but maintained a block on two more high-level nominees: Brian James Egan to be a State legal adviser and David Malcolm Robinson to be assistant secretary for conflict and stabilization operations and coordinator for reconstruction and stabilization. In November, Grassley also added a third hold on another top-level Obama State Department nominee, Thomas Shannon Jr., to be undersecretary of state for political affairs.

Grassley in his recent letter, however, hinted that if State continues working with his committee at the current pace, he could be amenable to releasing his holds.

“Assuming the committee receives the additional items promised by your staff in yesterday’s meeting, I intend to take action to recognize this progress before Senators leave town for the holiday break,” he said, nodding specifically to any copies of Pagliano emails they could discover by searching other employee’s emails.

Refugee Screening Process via White House

Posted on December 12, 2015December 12, 2015 by Denise Simon

Feds warn of bogus batch of Syrian passports amid report ISIS can print them

In part from FNC: Intelligence agencies have already flagged some 3,800 counterfeit Syrian passports, and will add data on another 10,000 fake Syrian passports recently intercepted in Bulgaria on the way to Germany. The sheer volume of fake passports flooding the market as refugees – or terrorists posing as refugees – pour into Europe has investigators on edge. The fake Syrian passports will add to an already challenging problem of vetting Syrian refugees, said Claude Arnold, a former DHS Investigations special agent in charge for Minneapolis and Los Angeles.

“In absence of specific intelligence that identifies the refugee as a member ISIS, we are not going to know they are a member of ISIS,” Arnold said. “We don’t have those boots on the ground in Syria, no one is really gathering that information, it’s a no mans land. So their application is based solely on story that person tells. It is dangerous, it is idiotic.”

Infographic: The Screening Process for Refugee Entry into the United States

November 20, 2015 at 7:09 PM ET by Amy Pope

‎

Refugees undergo more rigorous screening than anyone else we allow into the United States. Here’s what the screening process looks like for them:

The Screening Process for Refugees Entry Into the United States (full text of the graphic written below the image)

The Full Text of the Graphic:

The Screening Process for Refugee Entry Into the United States

Recurrent vetting: Throughout this process, pending applications continue to be checked against terrorist databases, to ensure new, relevant terrorism information has not come to light. If a match is found, that case is paused for further review. Applicants who continue to have no flags continue the process. If there is doubt about whether an applicant poses a security risk, they will not be admitted.

Many refugee applicants identify themselves to the U.N. Refugee Agency, UNHCR. UNHCR, then:
- Collects identifying documents
- Performs initial assessment
  - Collects biodata: name, address, birthday, place of birth, etc.
  - Collects biometrics: iris scans (for Syrians, and other refugee populations in the Middle East)
- Interviews applicants to confirm refugee status and the need for resettlement
  - Initial information checked again
- Only applicants who are strong candidates for resettlement move forward (less than 1% of global refugee population).
Applicants are received by a federally-funded Resettlement Support Center (RSC):
- Collects identifying documents
- Creates an applicant file
- Compiles information to conduct biographic security checks
Biographic security checks start with enhanced interagency security checks

Refugees are subject to the highest level of security checks of any category of traveler to the United States.
- U.S. security agencies screen the candidate, including:
  - National Counterterrorism Center/Intelligence Community
  - FBI
  - Department of Homeland Security
  - State Department
- The screening looks for indicators, like:
  - Information that the individual is a security risk
  - Connections to known bad actors
  - Outstanding warrants/immigration or criminal violations
- DHS conducts an enhanced review of Syrian cases, which may be referred to USCIS Fraud Detection and National Security Directorate for review. Research that is used by the interviewing officer informs lines of question related to the applicant’s eligibility and credibility.
Department of Homeland Security (DHS)/USCIS interview:
- Interviews are conducted by USCIS Officers specially trained for interviews
- Fingerprints are collected and submitted (biometric check)
- Re-interviews can be conducted if fingerprint results or new information raises questions. If new biographic information is identified by USCIS at an interview, additional security checks on the information are conducted. USCIS may place a case on hold to do additional research or investigation. Otherwise, the process continues.
Biometric security checks:
- Applicant’s fingerprints are taken by U.S. government employees
  - Fingerprints are screened against the FBI’s biometric database.
  - Fingerprints are screened against the DHS biometric database, containing watch-list information and previous immigration encounters in the U.S. and overseas.
  - Fingerprints are screened against the U.S. Department of Defense biometric database, which includes fingerprint records captured in Iraq and other locations.
- If not already halted, this is the end point for cases with security concerns. Otherwise, the process continues.
Medical check:
- The need for medical screening is determined
- This is the end point for cases denied due to medical reasons. Refugees may be provided medical treatment for communicable diseases such as tuberculosis.
Cultural orientation and assignment to domestic resettlement locations:
- Applicants complete cultural orientation classes.
- An assessment is made by a U.S.-based non-governmental organization to determine the best resettlement location for the candidate(s). Considerations include:
  - Family; candidates with family in a certain area may be placed in that area.
  - Health; a candidate with asthma may be matched to certain regions.
- A location is chosen.
Travel:
- International Organization for Migration books travel
- Prior to entry in the United States, applicants are subject to:
  - Screening from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s National Targeting Center-Passenger
  - The Transportation Security Administration’s Secure Flight Program
- This is the end point for some applicants. Applicants who have no flags continue the process.
U.S. Arrival:
- All refugees are required to apply for a green card within a year of their arrival to the United States, which triggers:
  - Another set of security procedures with the U.S. government.
- Refugees are woven into the rich fabric of American society!

‎Amy Pope is Deputy Assistant to the President for Homeland Security