Tuesday, August 25, 2015

Jeb Bush: Planned Parenthood ‘Not Actually Doing Women’s Health Issues’

For the second time this month, Jeb Bush has said something that is bound to end up in a general election attack ad, should he ever surpass Donald Trump.
Answering a question about federal funding for Planned Parenthood at a town hall meeting in Colorado, the Republican candidate reportedly said, “I, for one, don’t think Planned Parenthood ought to get a penny though, and that’s the difference because they’re not actually doing women’s health issues.”
It was at the Southern Baptist Forum in Nashville, Tennessee earlier this month that Bush uttered the line, “I’m not sure we need half a billion dollars for women’s health issues.”
In both instances, Hillary Clinton’s campaign fired back at Bush, this time highlighting the services Planned Parenthood provides beyond just abortions:
Jeb is just wrong. 2.7 million patients for 900K cancer screenings and 4.5M STI tests and treatments/year

Charlie Daniels' Open Letter to Congress: 'You've Betrayed Your Country'

I am a proud American who believes that America has held – and still holds – a very sensitive and special place in the affairs of mankind on Planet Earth. I believe that America has been divinely blessed and protected in our two centuries plus of existence.
I believe that America has been a counter balance that has cancelled out a lot of tyranny, evil and conquest, and admittedly, we have made a lot of mistakes. But on balance we have exerted a certain Pax Americana in the international affairs of mankind.
It took a lot of old fashioned guts for the Continental Congress to stand up to the world's mightiest military and tell them that we demanded our independence, even at the peril of going up against a far superior force on land and sea, and with only a ragtag army of untrained citizens, many of whom had to supply their own firearms.
It took courage above and beyond for Abraham Lincoln to push the country into a Civil War that he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt would divide this nation for decades.
It took guts to give the order for American troops to storm the beaches of Normandy on D-Day, straight into the face of artillery and machine gunfire, wave after wave being cut to ribbons by German shore emplacements.
The history of this nation is written in the blood and courage of men who stood in the face of overwhelming odds – politicians, soldiers, statesmen and ordinary citizens who sought to do the right thing regardless of the cost or the consequences.
Well, ladies and gentlemen of the United States Congress, it seems that that particular pen has run out of ink. The courageous politicians that once championed this nation have been replaced, for the most part, by a breed of milksop, politically correct, scared of their own shadow, pushover, pathetic excuses for public servants who are supposed to be representing a constituency of citizens who have to live with the circumstances of their timid folly.
You don't even have the courage to face down an out of control president, even when he makes a deal with the devil. Don't you bunch of timid capons even care what kind of world you're leaving to your children and grandchildren, not to even mention the rest of us? Are you really party partisans before your parents and grandparents or even human beings?
Be honest with yourselves a minute. Go into the bathroom and look in the mirror and ask the person you see this question: "Do I really believe that Iran will not use the money we're releasing to them to finance terrorists to kill Americans, and, when, not if, but when, the Iranians develop their nuclear device, will they really use it against America and Israel?"
You can’t hide from the truthful answer to that question forever, an answer will be required of you one day.
You have allowed Obama to tilt the Supreme Court so far to the left that they're little more than a shameful extension of the Executive Branch.
You have talked for decades about the porous southern border but have done absolutely nothing about it.
You have allowed cities in this nation to declare themselves sanctuary cities where they protect the worst of the worst criminal aliens, and American citizens are paying an awful price for your silence.
You watch an impossible National Debt balloon completely out of control, knowing full well that a day of reckoning is coming that will seriously curtail the quality of life for coming generations.
You allow corrupt government agencies like the IRS to run over the very people you are sworn to protect and allow the entitlement society to expand exponentially. All the while, you are actually entertaining the idea of raising taxes on those who still work and shoulder the burden.
You compose a third of the constitutionally mandated ruling system,and you shirk your duty
and allow this nation to move a little closer to the edge every day.
Your ratings are in the single digits; your morals are in the gutter; your minds are on self-preservation; and somewhere along the way, you’ve traded your honor for political expediency.
You've violated your oaths; you've betrayed your country; you've feathered your nests; and you've sat on your hands while an imperial president has rubbed your noses in the dirt time after time.
You're no longer men. You're puppets, caricatures, jokes, a gaggle of fading prostitutes for sale to anybody who can do you a political favor.
“For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”
What do you think?
Pray for our troops and the peace of Jerusalem.
God Bless America
Charlie Daniels
Charlie Daniels is a legendary American singer, song writer, guitarist, and fiddler famous for his contributions to country and southern rock music. Daniels has been active as a singer since the early 1950s. He was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry on January 24, 2008.

San Diego Takes the Lead in Greenpeace Strike

On August 5, 16 of 19 canvassers for Greenpeace in San Diego walked off the job. They were followed by a majority of the Sacramento office. 22 total employees of the Frontline program, Greenpeace’s in-house fundraising program, have had enough of labor policies that give them no job security.
The strike, led by two veteran canvassers in Socialist Alternative San Diego, comes against an organization that claims to be progressive. However, Greenpeace uses a quota system where even veteran fundraisers can be fired for missing quota two or three weeks consecutively. Senior workers bring in six or seven times their salary in recurring donations, yet are routinely fired. Morale is understandably very low. But choosing to resist, they have mobilized in defense of their jobs and dignity. Non-profits beware: the persuasive skills developed by your employees can be used against you. Instead of selling Greenpeace, organizers now sell the strike against it.
Tara Dawn, a strike member from the Sacramento field office, said “As a single mother, I work hard week in and week out not knowing if I’ll have a dependable paycheck to keep a roof over our heads. That is a very difficult reality to face. I love my job and the organization I work for, but myself and the all of the other canvassers deserve to see reform.”
Resistance to reform, both in senior and mid-level Greenpeace administration, emphasizes the presence of “the worker elite”. Despite being former fundraisers themselves, low-level managers have decided not to stand in solidarity with their former co-workers, their interests now aligning with their superiors. In the absence of help from those potential allies, the street-level workers have banded together, using democratic methods and a sophisticated media campaign to damage Greenpeace’s most valuable asset: its image and reputation.
Canvassers have great labor power for two main reasons. First, because they gather monthly donations, each $20 donation that is not gathered is multiplied, since most people donate for 9 or 10 months before canceling. Second, attempts to bring in strikebreaking replacements are frustrated because good canvassers emerge from training, not raw talent. The trainers are on strike, thus nobody can truly be their replacement.
Socialists everywhere should stand in the new areas of labor struggle. Thousands of vulnerable canvassers for all sorts of non-profits can learn from a strong victory.
Their Facebook page is: facebook.com/GreenpeaceOnStrike
Their strike fund page is: crowdrise.com/GreenpeaceOnStrike

Andrew Mackay along with friends Bryan Kim and Joe Henry are all members of Socialist Alternative. Bryan and Joe are ex-Greenpeace, and have organized members of the Frontline program, the street canvassers, to strike in San Diego and Sacramento. With the national organization not thinking the threat serious, the strike now enjoys growing support from members in all national sections of Greenpeace, other non-profit leaders, and labor- such as Sarah Saez, program director of United Taxi Workers of San Diego. The strike began August 5 and is continuing, with negotiations beginning in California soon.

Stop sign cameras in mountain parks may take a hike

The Santa Monica Mountains are home to nearly 400 species of birds, more than 50 threatened or endangered plants and animals, and seven threatened or endangered photo-enforced stop signs.
State Sen. Fran Pavley, D-Agoura Hills, wants to save the ticket-mailing stop signs from extinction, but Senate Republican Leader Bob Huff, R-Diamond Bar, has introduced a bill to kill them off. In January, Senate Bill 218 will return to the Senate Natural Resources Committee for a second time, after Pavley, chair of the committee, blocked it in May.
“I find it promising that some of my colleagues believe, as I do, that no matter how noble the goal, the MRCA needs to better justify its stop sign camera enforcement program,” Huff said.
MRCA is the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority. It was formed in 1985 when the Conejo Recreation and Park District and the Rancho Simi Recreation and Park District joined with the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy to acquire, develop and conserve park and open-space lands. Today MRCA manages 72,000 acres of public lands from Ventura County to the San Gabriel Mountains.
MRCA’s noble goal is the safety of park visitors, whether they are hiking, dog-walking, bicycling, pushing a baby stroller or driving.
In pursuit of this goal, MRCA operates seven photo-enforced stop signs in its parks, which together generate $1.5 million annually in gross revenue. The automated system sends out about 25,000 tickets a year at $100 a pop, jumping to $500 for the third violation within 12 months.
The tickets are mailed to the registered owner of the vehicle as identified from a photo of the rear license plate. Appeals of violations are handled internally at MRCA and then can be taken to the Superior Court — about 50 percent of the tickets are tossed out. They are administrative citations, which don’t count against an individual’s driving record, but unpaid tickets are turned over to a collection agency.
It is disputed whether MRCA’s system, unique in California, is legal under the state’s vehicle code, and whether the placement of the signs is really motivated by safety concerns. Supervising ranger Jewel Johnson told the Senate committee the signs are thoughtfully placed to protect pedestrians and to slow down speeding commuters who use park roads as a shortcut.
But a recent visit to two of the parks calls that claim into question.
Near the entrance to Marvin Braude Mulholland Gateway Park, located at the south end of Reseda Boulevard, a photo-enforced stop sign is placed at a mid-point in the road where there is no intersection. A crosswalk in front of the stop line leads to a hiking trail on one side, but it seems unnecessary to force every car to come to a complete stop on the road leading out of the park if no one is waiting to cross.
The Top of Topanga Overlook is a narrow walkway where visitors can see a wide view of the San Fernando Valley. The tiny park has 16 parking spaces, three picnic tables, a few benches, some deceased shrubs and a photo-enforced stop sign. It nails drivers as they exit the park in a right-turn-only lane that puts them on northbound Topanga Canyon Boulevard. The placement of the sign doesn’t protect pedestrians or slow traffic in the park. It’s just a stop sign at the end of a right-turn lane, and the fines for rolling through it go to MRCA.
The fines also go to Redflex Traffic Systems Inc., a Phoenix company that makes red light camera systems and speed enforcement cameras as well as the stop sign setups.
In June, former Redflex CEO Karen Finley pleaded guilty to federal bribery charges for giving money to officials in Columbus and Cincinnati in order to land contracts. And last year, Chicago ended its relationship with Redflex after a federal grand jury issued a 23-count indictment accusing the company of paying off city officials to get $124 million in public contracts.
Here in California, Redflex has spent $1.2 million lobbying the state Legislature since 2009.
Redflex is opposed to Sen. Huff’s bill, which would make photo-enforced stop signs illegal in the Santa Monica Mountains and everywhere else in the state.
“We all share a common love for our public parks and want people to have a safe and enjoyable experience while visiting them,” Huff said. “We shouldn’t be punishing people who are enjoying a day in the park with an arbitrary ticket.”

FORMER OBAMA ADVISOR: JOE BIDEN VS. HILLARY CLINTON RACE WOULD BE ‘FAMILY FEUD’

NOTHING LIKE THE FAMILY EATING THEIR YOUNG (OR OLD IN THIS CASE)

Dan Pfeiffer, a former senior advisor to President Obama, described a potential presidential run by Vice President Joe Biden as a “family feud,” if he challenged Hillary Clinton for the nomination.

“It’s very tough,” Pfeiffer admitted during an interview on CNN, calling Biden “one of the best guys you’ll ever be around” but added that other Obama staffers were “incredibly fond” of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
“This would be a family feud, a lot of people knew everyone on both sides, you know both of the candidates,” Pfeiffer admitted when asked about how Obama loyalties would split.
Pfeiffer pointed out that former staffers from President Bill Clinton’s White House and Hillary Clinton’s campaign came to work for Obama and that many staffers from Obama’s White House went to work for Hillary’s current presidential campaign.
He pointed out that Biden was the “most clear continuation of the Obama legacy” who also had his own record and was “energetic and young at heart.”
“He runs full force at everything he does, he’s full of energy,” he added, praising Biden.
On Twitter this morning, Pfeiffer continued his praise of Biden.
“Lots of reasons to run or not run, but legacy shouldn’t be one,” he said. “Vice President Joe Biden’s place in the history books as greatest Vice President ever is secure no matter what.”\

Monday, August 24, 2015

The Story Behind That Viral Photo Of Donald Trump’s Crowd In Alabama

When Sydnie Shuford and her husband took their son, Jackson, to see Donald Trump’s speech at a football stadium in Mobile, Ala. on Friday, she couldn’t imagine that a photo of her family with the Republican presidential candidate would go viral.
But by Monday, the Washington Post’s Chris Cillizza devoted more than 500 words to “breaking down this amazing Donald Trump picture from his Alabama rally.” Thousands liked and shared it on BuzzFeed’s Facebook page. And Mediaitewrote about how it had even inspired “hilarious photoshop gold.”
In the photo, a visibly thrilled Shuford is holding her 8-month old son. Her face shows the excitement of the moment. Trump has his hands on the baby’s face. Shuford’s husband is seen snapping his own photo. Someone behind them is holding a sign that says “Thank You Lord Jesus For President Trump.”
In an email to The Daily Caller, Shuford explains what was really going on. “As Mr. Trump came by, he said, ‘What a cutie!’ and gave my son a kiss,” she recalled. “I guess my expression in the picture shows my surprise that this event actually took place. The camera caught a combination of me laughing hysterically while yelling to my husband, ‘Did you get the pic?'”
But while she may look like an ardent Trump supporter in the photo, Shuford says her family went more out of curiosity and she is open to hearing from other candidates.
“I went to see Donald Trump because I have watched his television show and I have enjoyed him for years,” she said. “My attendance didn’t have much to do with politics at this point in time. I was simply curious.”
“My husband and I enjoyed the picture, and laughed at nearly all of the photo shops and captions,” she added. “We were, however, disturbed to see the negative comments people were making in response to the newspaper stories and the picture.”
Here is Shuford’s full re-telling of the story behind the photo:
This is the story of how a young woman from Mobile Alabama, came to be in a picture that went viral.
Friday, Aug. 21 was like any other Friday. I was finishing up the work week and looking forward to the weekend. My husband and our two older daughters wanted to go the rally to see Mr. Trump’s speech. No one can argue the fact that Trump has a great brand and regardless of political affiliation, he is very entertaining.
I kept thinking of pictures one always sees of politicians kissing babies. Being a new mother, I thought how funny it would be if Donald Trump saw my son, and we could snap a picture of him giving our baby a kiss.
During the speech, I meandered my way through the crowds of people, so I could get a place on the front row. As Mr. Trump came by, he said, “What a cutie!” and gave my son a kiss. I guess my expression in the picture shows my surprise that this event actually took place. The camera caught a combination of me laughing hysterically while yelling to my husband, “Did you get the pic?” (The man on my left in the picture who is leaning back and taking a photo is my husband).
My husband and I enjoyed the picture, and laughed at nearly all of the photo shops and captions. We were however disturbed to see the negative comments people were making in response to the newspaper stories and the picture. These attacks were made against me, the collective group of people around me, the city of Mobile and the state of Alabama. “Alabamians are racist, stupid, have the lowest IQs in the country, the highest school dropout rate, etc.” I never realized until this experience how difficult it would be to hear such insults about my beloved city and state.
Here is the truth: I am a wife and mother of three, and I am employed full-time as a guidance counselor. I love my students regardless of ethnicity or affluence. I went to see Donald Trump because I have watched his television show and I have enjoyed him for years. My attendance didn’t have much to do with politics at this point in time. I was simply curious.
Mobile does not receive much attention from politicians, much less celebrities and as a member of this community I believe it is not only “southern hospitality” but good manners to show up and listen to what a candidate has to say. Furthermore, as a citizen of this great country, I feel an obligation to make informed a decision before I vote. Rest assured, I will attend speeches given by members of the other party as well.

President who once called for a 'new era of civility' now calls opponents 'crazies'

Remember when, following the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, President Obama sanctimoniously lectured the nation on the need for a “new era of civility”?  Speaking before thousands in an arena at the University of Arizona, he solemnly told us:
At a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized, at a time when we are far too eager to lay the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who think differently than we do ... it’s important for us to pause for a moment and make sure that we are talking with each other in a way that heals, not a way that wounds.
Obviously, that was just so much hypocritical blather.  Yesterday, in Nevada before a Democratic fundraiser crowd, the self-described “feisty” president was not at all interested in healing a nation deeply divided on his deal with the Iranian mullahs.
Obama declared himself ready for the challenges he faces this fall in dealing with a Republican Congress that disagrees with him on the budget, energy policy, education and much more.
Obama said that as he'd ridden to the fundraiser with Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid, they'd done some reminiscing and spent some time “figuring out how we are going to deal with the crazies in terms of managing some problems.”
He didn't identify exactly who the two of them had defined as “crazies.
Multiplying the hypocrisy, the president pivoted from insulting his opponents to self-righteous invocation of higher principle:
But Obama spoke at length about his differences with the GOP Congress. And he lamented that “too often, our political debates are not about what's best for the country but what's best for the next election.”
So how is it possible for a serious man to be so fork-tongued as to insult those who disagree with him while donning the mantle of statesmanship and civility?  Actually, President Obama answered this question a couple of years ago: 
I actually believe my own bullshit.
Let’s hope that when the billion-dollar fundraising for his presidential library and related monuments is completed, that aphorism will be engraved in stone above the entrance.




Here's What Clinton's Classified Emails Discussed ...

Hillary Clinton's classified emails contain discussions of conversations with foreign diplomats, issues with embassy security and relations with countries from Russia to China.
The broad range of information that was deemed classified by the State Department — just within the emails published by the agency to date —underscores concerns that sensitive material was routinely mishandled on Clinton's private email server.
For example, Huma Abedin, Clinton's former deputy chief of staff, forwarded a summary of a high-level Sept. 2009 meeting to Clinton in which she detailed the "embassy security issues" that were discussed.
The issues had been raised by Eric Boswell, a diplomatic security official who was later forced to resign in the wake of the 2012 terror attack in Benghazi.
Abedin was frequently involved in the transmission of classified information to Clinton, emails show.
Cheryl Mills, Clinton's former chief of staff, and Jake Sullivan, former director of policy planning, also routinely sent or received classified emails from the secretary of state.
Despite her campaign's claims that Clinton was simply a "passive recipient" of classified information, a review of her emails indicates she wrote messages that are now classified.
For example, in July 2009, she discussed relations with Russia and Afghanistan with then-Deputy Secretary William Burns in an email that has been partially classified. She also discussed her travel plans with Burns over the private network.
Other classified conversations involved one of Clinton's present Democratic challengers for president: then-Sen. Jim Webb.

GOP Presidential Nominees Fire Back at Brown on Climate Change Challenge

After submitting a letter-length question to Republican candidates ahead of their first round of primary-season debates, Gov. Jerry Brown has received some responses.

Heated rhetoric

Pressing ahead with the environmental emphasis characterizing his final term in office, Brown asked the presidential hopefuls to outline their own policies. “Longer fire seasons, extreme weather and severe droughts aren’t on the horizon, they’re […] here to stay,” he wrote, as the Sacramento Bee reported. “Given the challenge and the stakes, my question for you is simple: What are you going to do about it? What is your plan to deal with the threat of climate change?”
Brown’s office told the Bee he submitted his question via the Facebook page of Fox News, which solicited questions from viewers of the debates, which it hosted and televised.
This month, as the San Gabriel Valley Tribute noted, Brown hit out against the field again, using a fresh report on July temperatures to lambaste “Republicans, foot-dragging corporations and other deniers.” Surveying the damage to the fire-stricken Clear Lake area, Brown “repeated his challenge to Republican presidential candidates,” the Los Angeles Times reported, warning that “California is burning” and asking, bluntly, “What the hell are you going to do about it?”

Republican responses

So far, at least three Republican candidates have touched on environmental issues in the wake of Brown’s challenges.
Not all their remarks have been directly responsive, however. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker recently took the opportunity to critique “radical environmental policies that stop things like dams from going in so that water … can be used effectively,”according to the Bee.
But Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and former HP CEO Carly Fiorina, who had challenged Sen. Barbara Boxer’s re-election, both addressed Brown head on, the Bee added. While Cruz dismissed “alarmists” as power-hungry schemers, Fiorina took a more nuanced approach; although she first conceded it “may well be true” that California’s drought was worsened by climate change, she also criticized policymakers for failing to prepare for the kind of droughts the state has had “for millennia.”

Shifting opinions

Republicans on the campaign trail have broadly reflected opinions among constituents nationwide. Even in California, Republicans have demonstrated consistent skepticism toward claims that human activity has fostered dangerous alterations in temperatures and weather. In a new poll conducted by the Public Policy Institute of California, a majority of Golden State Republicans said “they don’t believe that climate change is happening and that they don’t think it will be a serious problem in the future,” as the San Jose Mercury Newsreported. “They also support expanding fossil fuel production — from increasing offshore oil drilling along California’s coast to expanding fracking.”
Yet the poll evinced some wiggle room on environmental policy issues. Fully 43 percent of California Republican respondents supported stricter in-state climate rules than what the federal government has passed into law. “Californians of all parties said they support increasing tax credits for electric vehicles and solar power,” the Mercury News added.
In a recent nonpartisan poll commissioned by a water policy foundation, Californians seemed to confirm that the drought had become a leading issue of worry across the ideological spectrum. According to the Los Angeles Times, “62 percent of poll subjects said they would be very willing or somewhat willing to pay $4 more a month for water if the funds were used to improve water supply reliability. Such an increase, if applied to the entire state, would generate about a billion dollars, according to poll sponsors.”

Environmentalists divided

Brown’s environmentalist policies haven’t satisfied all critics. His administration’s emphasis on reducing emissions, for instance, has led some to wonder why he hasn’t pushed harder for cheaper electricity rates, which would benefit owners of many zero-emissions vehicles. One objection, recently voiced in the San Diego Daily Transcript, warned that Brown’s policies “will systematically shift profits into a few private hands instead of building, managing and maintaining a solid and reliable electric-charging infrastructure comparable to our utility grid.”

SEN. DIANNE FEINSTEIN WANTS OBAMA TO WALL-OFF 1 MILLION ACRES IN DESERT

U.S. Senator 
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)
0%
 asked President Barack Obama on Friday to bypass Congress and use the Antiquities Act of 1906 to create three new national monuments in the California desert.

The move  would extend federal protection over more than 1 million acres of mountain ranges, sandy expanses and forests running roughly between Palm Springs and the Nevada border.
Feinstein has argued that the area she wants designated as ‘Mojave Trails, Sand to Snow and Castle Mountains’ as a home to mountain lions, the California desert tortoise and bighorn sheep. But the real effort is to ban off-roaders, hunters and miners.
Section 3 required an “examination of ruins, the excavation of archaeological sites, or the gathering of objects of antiquity” on lands administered by the Departments of Interior, Agriculture, or War. The objects were then to be collected “for the benefit of reputable museums, universities, colleges, or other recognized scientific or educational institutions, with a view to increasing the knowledge of such objects.”
But over the next century, Presidents from both parties, beginning with Republican Theodore Roosevelt, took advantage of the law to restrict private economic opportunity and take overrule state control. Republicans from a number of states consider the law to be outdated and are pushing for bills that would curtail Presidential authority.
President Barack Obama in February of this year proclaimed Pullman Historic District of Chicago, Browns Canyon in Colorado, and a former Honouliuli Internment Camp site in Hawaii as national monuments under the Antiquities Act. Congressional Republicans from Colorado reacted harshly to the designation of Browns Canyon, with onerepresentative saying Obama was acting like “King Barack.”
Although the act specifically directs the President to limit the designation to the “smallest area compatible with proper care and management of the objects to be protected,” Yet, 16 Presidents have designated more than over 150 monuments. Beginning in 1906, Devils Tower in Wyoming became the first national monument. Other iconic monuments include the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, the Channel Islands and the Arches National Park.
President George W. Bush used the Antiquities Act five times and President Bill Clinton used it 19 times. But of the 285 million acres of land and marine areas designated as monuments, President Obama used his powers under the Antiquities Act to set aside 260 million acres of land and water.

America's Sanctuary City Nightmare

A litigation battle is raging between the states and President Barack Obama over his attempt to impose a nationwide “sanctuary” policy for illegal aliens. Yet, there is no question that existing sanctuary policies implemented by numerous towns and cities have victimized innocent Americans. Those sanctuary policies have enabled illegal aliens to commit thousands of crimes –crimes that would not have occurred had their perpetrators been deported in keeping with existing law.
In 2011, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a study on approximately 250,000 illegal aliens locked up in our federal, state, and local prisons. They represent more than a quarter of all of the prisoners in the federal prison system alone. The GAO’s “study population” had been arrested nearly 1.7 million times and committed three million offenses, averaging about seven arrests and 12 offenses per criminal alien. The incarcerated aliens had been arrested for a vast array of crimes:
- 49 percent had been arrested for drugs;
- 37 percent for burglary, stolen property or robbery;
- 35 percent for assault;
- 21 percent for fraud, forgery or counterfeiting;
- 19 percent for weapons violations;
- 13 percent for homicide or kidnapping, and
- 12 percent for sex crimes.
Three states—California, Texas and Arizona—bore the brunt of the crime wave induced by these criminal illegal aliens, although other states—e.g., Florida and New York—suffered significant problems due to criminal illegal aliens, as well. In Texas, drugs, sex offenses, and assault were the top three offenses for which illegal aliens were incarcerated. A recent report from the Texas Department of Public Safety obtained by J. Christian Adams of PJ Media showed that from 2008 to 2014, illegal aliens committed over 600,000 crimes in Texas, including nearly 3,000 homicides and almost 8,000 sexual assaults.
Jessica Vaughan of the Center for Immigration Studies analyzed Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) records and found that during just one eight-month period in 2014, sanctuary jurisdictions released more than 8,100 deportable aliens. Of those, 62 percent had a prior criminal record; 3,000 were convicted felons. Of those released, 1,900 were later rearrested a total of 4,300 times on 7,500 different offenses. As Vaughan says, “when local jurisdictions shield aliens wanted by the feds, the aliens can commit more crimes.”
And that is exactly what happened recently in San Francisco. Kathryn Steinle, a 32-year-old resident of the city, was out for a walk with her father on Pier 14. She was shot and killed by an illegal alien who had seven felonies on his record and had already been deported five times.  ICE had already started another deportation process for Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, but the federal government transferred him to San Francisco at the city’s request because he had an outstanding drug charge against him.

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