U.S. Politics

[Rick Plant]

Republicans have voted against Americans each and every time, and here's another perfect example with President Biden's Child Tax Credit. But Republicans falsely take fake credit when Democratic laws are popular with their voters. Their voters should be voting for Democrats because Republicans are giving them nothing.     

Child Tax Credit Payouts Biggest in GOP States, Despite No Republicans Voting for Bill


The expanded Child Tax Credit has benefited Republican states and is popular among the party’s voters, a new analysis found, despite the fact that it received no GOP support in Congress. In this photo, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) speaks during a press conference on the Child Tax Credit at the U.S. Capitol on July 15.

President Joe Biden's expanded Child Tax Credit has benefited Republican states and is popular among the party's voters, a new analysis found, despite the fact that it received no GOP support in Congress.

Reuters, using data from the Treasury Department, found the top 10 states by average monthly payouts in August were Utah, Idaho, South Dakota, Alaska, Nebraska, Wyoming, North Dakota, Iowa, Kansas and Montana.

All of those states voted for Donald Trump over Biden in the 2020 election, and all but one, Kansas, is led by a Republican governor.

The news organization also found that the policy has broad support among the public: 59 percent of U.S. adults backed it in a recent poll, including 41 percent of respondents who identified as Republicans.

In fact, the Child Tax Credit was far more popular among Republicans than Biden, who in the latest poll garnered 11 percent job approval from self-identified conservatives.

But the benefit, which was part of the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, didn't receive a single Republican vote.

The legislation passed the U.S. House of Representatives in a party line vote, and the Senate used a process known as reconciliation to bypass the filibuster. The coronavirus relief package was ultimately signed by Biden in March with zero GOP support.

The expanded and advanceable Child Tax Credit—which bumped the payout from $2,000 to $3,600 for each child aged 6 to 17, or $3,000 per child under 6—began being dispersed among eligible households in July.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) sent out more than $15 billion in August in the second round of monthly payments for child tax credit. The payout went to families that include roughly 61 million eligible children.

The July payment was predominately used by households to pay for food, according to a U.S. Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey. The benefit was also largely used to pay for utilities and clothing.

Some Republican lawmakers have touted the child tax credit and other aspects of the American Rescue Plan, such as restaurant relief and health funding, even though they rejected the legislation.

Biden mocked those promoting the bill they didn't support, holding up a list of names guilty of the behavior during a press conference.

"I mean, some people have no shame," the president said. "But I'm happy. I'm happy they know that it benefited their constituents. That's OK with me. But if you're going to try to take credit for what you've done, don't get in the way of what we still need to do."

Democrats are seeking to extend the Child Tax Credit expansion for an additional four years as part of a $3.5 trillion spending bill largely opposed by Republicans on Capitol Hill.

https://www.newsweek.com/child-tax-credit-payouts-biggest-gop-states-despite-no-republicans-voting-bill-1629809

[Richard Smith]

The media continues to celebrate the US governments seizure of assets from private individuals because they are: 1)  Russian and 2) wealthy.  Individuals are being fired from their jobs and subject to harassment due to their nationality.  Imagine the hue and cry if the US government had done this to Chinese citizens in response to the pandemic?  It would have been decried as racism.  An unbelievable overreach of governmental authority that hasn't occurred since the Japanese internment camps of WWII. 

[Richard Smith]

Biden held a super spreader event this week that has disabled half the government.  Imagine bringing all these people together during a pandemic for a photo op?  Not a mask to be seen.  His attorney general, commerce secretary, sister, and Nancy Pelosi have all since tested positive.  Who knows how many others were infected?

[Rick Plant]

An historic day for America as the first black woman is confirmed to the Supreme Court. Joe Biden has kept another campaign promise as he clearly stated under a Biden presidency we will have the first black woman on the Supreme Court. Judge Jackson is one of the most qualified justices ever to be on our court and it was despicable how Senate Republicans treated her during the hearings with their vicious racist attacks and smears. Not a good look for Republicans as the overwhelming majority of Americans support her.   

Senate confirms Ketanji Brown Jackson to Supreme Court, making her the first Black woman to serve as a justice

The Senate confirmed Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court, making her the first Black woman to serve on the top U.S. court.

The 53-47 final vote tally showed bipartisan support for Jackson, with three Republicans joining all Democrats to elevate the 51-year-old federal judge to a lifetime appointment.

Jackson is President Joe Biden’s first Supreme Court nominee. She will replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer, 83, who was confirmed to the bench in 1994.


US President Joe Biden and judge Ketanji Brown Jackson watch the Senate vote on her nomination to an an associate justice on the US Supreme Court, from the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, DC on April 7, 2022.

The Senate on Thursday confirmed Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court, making her the 116th justice — and the first Black woman — to serve on the top U.S. court.

The 53-47 final vote tally showed bipartisan support for Jackson, with three Republicans joining all Democrats to elevate the 51-year-old federal judge to a lifetime appointment on the high court.

“This is a great moment for Judge Jackson, but it is a greater moment for America as we rise to a more perfect union,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said before the vote.

Jackson is President Joe Biden’s first Supreme Court nominee. She will replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer, 83, who was confirmed to the bench in 1994.

Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Black woman ever to hold that title, presided over the vote to confirm Jackson. Harris appeared to momentarily choke up with emotion as she read out the vote result, which drew a swell of applause and cheering from the Senate floor.

Jackson will join a court that has grown substantially more conservative following the appointment of three of former President Donald Trump’s nominees. Her addition will maintain the size of the court’s liberal wing, which is outnumbered 6-3 by the conservative bloc.

Just five women — Sandra Day O’Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett — have served on the Supreme Court. Only two Black men, Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas, have ever been appointed to the bench. No Black women have previously sat on the high court.

“Judge Jackson’s confirmation was a historic moment for our nation,” Biden said in a tweet after the vote. “We’ve taken another step toward making our highest court reflect the diversity of America. She will be an incredible Justice, and I was honored to share this moment with her.”

Jackson is also set to become the first Supreme Court justice to have served as a public defender. Democrats have touted that experience as more evidence that Jackson will bring fresh perspective to the historically homogeneous court.

Public defenders are assigned to defend people in criminal cases who may otherwise be unable to hire their own counsel, a constitutional right. Republicans, however, have tried to wield Jackson’s public-defender experience against her by accusing her of sympathizing with the views or actions of some of her past clients, including detainees at the Guantanamo Bay military prison in Cuba.

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., was criticized for remarking Tuesday on the Senate floor that while former Justice Robert Jackson “left the Supreme Court to go to Nuremberg and prosecute the case against the Nazis ... this Judge Jackson might have gone there to defend them.”

Jackson fielded that criticism and others during more than 23 hours of questioning over two grueling days of confirmation hearings in the Senate Judiciary Committee last month.


Members of the House Congressional Black Caucus speak after the successful confirmation of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as the first Black woman ever to serve on the Supreme Court, at the US Capitol in Washington, DC, April 7, 2022.

While her qualifications and temperament were rarely questioned, Republicans tore into Jackson’s judicial record, arguing that her rulings show a willingness to legislate from the bench. They also focused intently on her sentencing record in a handful of child-pornography cases, accusing her of doling out light punishments to those offenders.

Fact-checkers have disputed that characterization, and Democratic committee members pushed back aggressively against the Republicans’ criticisms.

Members of the American Bar Association, which unanimously awarded Jackson its top rating of “Well Qualified,” also defended Jackson’s record during her confirmation hearings.

Despite her endorsements, Republicans including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell have framed Jackson as a fellow travelers of far-left politics.

But after her confirmation hearings, Jackson picked up the support of centrist Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah.

“While I do not expect to agree with every decision she may make on the Court, I believe that she more than meets the standard of excellence and integrity,” Romney said when he announced his support Monday.

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/07/ketanji-brown-jackson-confirmed-to-supreme-court-first-black-woman-justice.html

[Rick Plant]

Six more Republicans sued over Constitution’s ban on insurrectionists running for office



A legal effort to bar politicians who participated in events that led up to the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol from running for reelection is gaining steam after lawsuits were filed suit against three Arizona GOP lawmakers and three from Wisconsin to bar them under the 14th Amendment from running again.

"In three separate candidacy challenges filed in Superior Court in Maricopa County, Ariz., voters and the progressive group, Free Speech for People, targeted Representatives Paul Gosar and Andy Biggs and State Representative Mark Finchem, who is running for Arizona secretary of state with former President Donald J. Trump’s endorsement," The New York Times reports. "A separate action is being pursued by a Democratic-aligned super PAC against Senator Ron Johnson and Representatives Tom Tiffany and Scott Fitzgerald, all Wisconsin Republicans."

The suits allege that the lawmakers are not qualified to run for office due to their support for rioters who stormed the Capitol building that day, making them "insurrectionists" as defined by the Constitution.

The little-known third section of the 14th Amendment declares that “no person shall” hold “any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath” to “support the Constitution,” had then “engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”

Read the full report over at The New York Times:

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/07/us/politics/insurrectionists-congress.html

[Rick Plant]

Seditionists and insurrectionists have no place in our government as stated in the Constitution. All of them need to be barred from holding a government position. Paul Gosar and Marjorie Taylor Greene are white nationalists who speak at white nationalist conventions. Madison Cawthorn and Paul Gosar are both Nazi Hitier sympathizers. They have no business being in Congress.   

Two more GOP ‘insurrectionists’ face ballot challenges as voters seek to disqualify them from office



Activists have challenged whether Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC) can run for reelection after his alleged participation in the Jan. 6 attempt to stop the certification of the 2020 election and overthrow the result for President Donald Trump. Now Reps. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Paul Gosar (R-AZ) are getting the same challenge.

The argument is that a clause in the 14th Amendment stops “insurrectionists” from running for Congress. In the case of Cawthorn, U.S. District Judge Richard E. Myers II claimed that The Amnesty Act of 1872 eliminated the section of the law by declaring "all political disabilities imposed by the third section" of the 14th Amendment were "hereby removed from all persons whomsoever." The problem that Cawthorn, and now Gosar and Biggs, will likely face is that there can't be an amendment to the Constitution by a law alone.

There are three lawsuits that were filed on Thursday over the Republican members' alleged participation in the Jan. 6 attack.

"The voters are represented by Free Speech For People, a nonpartisan, non-profit legal advocacy organization with constitutional law expertise, which is serving as co-lead counsel in the matter, alongside the Tempe-based election law firm Barton Mendez Soto and the New York-based firm Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel," the group said.

While The Amnesty Act may have given an agreed-upon pass to Confederate Soldiers, the legal argument is that without amending the 14th Amendment, the act technically is unconstitutional.

To pass an amendment to the Constitution, the document outlines, "Congress may submit a proposed constitutional amendment to the states, if the proposed amendment language is approved by a two-thirds vote of both houses. Congress must call a convention for proposing amendments upon application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the states (i.e., 34 of 50 states). Amendments proposed by Congress or convention become valid only when ratified by the legislatures of, or conventions in, three-fourths of the states (i.e., 38 of 50 states)."

The Amnesty Proclamation of December 1863 gave blanket pardons to all those who had not held a Confederate civil office, would sign the oath of allegiance to the United States and who hadn't abused prisoners.

So, the question is whether a judge in another district court would rule differently.

All candidates in Arizona must file nomination papers with the Secretary of State that requires they declare they “will be qualified at the time of election to hold the office the person seeks.” According to the Free Speech for the People group, to enforce that requirement, “any elector” may challenge a candidate’s nomination “for any reason relating to qualifications for the office sought as prescribed by law.” That is the rule under which they are issuing the suits.

Read the full piece at the Free Speech for People site:

https://freespeechforpeople.org/arizona-voters-challenge-congressmen-gosar-and-biggs-and-state-rep-finchem-candidate-for-secretary-of-state-under-fourteenth-amendments-insurrectionist-disqualification-clause/

[Richard Smith]

The noose continues to tighten on Biden, Inc.  CBS News (a bastion of leftist ideology) is reporting that there were a shocking 150 suspect transactions to the accounts of Hunter and James Biden.  Including millions from Commie China!  Wow.  Hunter might actually get a lengthy prison sentence.  I thought the corrupt DOJ would cut a deal in which Hunter pleads to a few crimes and does no jail time.  But he is going to the slammer.  James Biden as well.  And it is hard to understand how Old Joe avoids impeachment since he is in this up to his neck.  I would expect the impeachment to begin after the mid-term elections.  This makes Watergate look like child's play.