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House panel threatens to cut defense secretary budget over Bergdahl stonewalling

The head of a powerful House panel is threatening to withhold defense funding over the department's alleged stonewalling in a probe of the controversial swap of five Taliban leaders for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl. 
Former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel had initially pledged to respond to questions, when lawmakers first demanded to know why the Pentagon had not given Congress the requisite 30-day notice before proceeding with the May 31 prisoner trade.
But nearly a year later, the Pentagon has released only a trickle of highly redacted emails from before the swap.
Republican lawmakers now plan to attempt the unusual step of locking down about $500 million -- a quarter of the defense secretary's office budget -- until the Pentagon provides all the documents that the House Armed Services Committee has demanded as part of its investigation. Chairman Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, on Monday plans to introduce a provision to the 2016 National Defense Authorization Act to withhold the money from Defense Secretary Ash Carter's office budget until they comply.
"It's a strange posture for this department, because usually the committee has a better relationship with DoD," a Hill source close to the investigation told Fox News. "It looks like the guidance they are receiving is coming from outside the building."
Fox News was shown examples of the emails that thus far have been shared with the House Armed Services Committee investigators. Key parts were redacted, making them nearly unintelligible at key moments when Pentagon officials were discussing the potential transfer.
In one such email, a Pentagon public affairs officer was briefing a defense lawyer on what the department planned to tell the press about the transfer of the five Taliban leaders from Guantanamo Bay, but the relevant sections were blacked out.
One of the few unredacted sections reads: "We should not use this line which is just a pointless stick in congress' eye."
Thornberry wants to compel the Pentagon to lift the redactions of the unclassified emails that the department has so far provided.
The committee also is demanding all documents related to the Department of Justice's recommendations on the Bergdahl swap. So far, the committee has received 3,000 pages of emails from the Pentagon, but committee staffers say key interagency communications on the Bergdahl trade have not been produced.
"We have no idea what percent of the emails we have," a source close to the investigation said. "It's taken a year."
Pentagon officials say they began providing relevant communications and emails in July.
Department spokesman Army Lt. Col. Joe Sowers said in a statement: "Redactions to the documents have been minimal, and the Department has committed to working with the HASC to accommodate their requests for information."
He said committee staff have conducted 10 transcribed interviews with department personnel.
"The committee was also provided a substantive paper articulating the administration's legal analysis on the transfer of the five detainees," he said.
By law, the Pentagon is supposed to notify Congress about its intent to release Guantanamo prisoners 30 days before doing so, according to the National Defense Authorization Act.
In the case of the Bergdahl swap, it did not.
At the time, White House officials said there had not been time to do so for fear that the opportunity to retrieve Bergdahl -- now facing desertion charges -- was fleeting.
Stephen W. Preston, general counsel of the Department of Defense, said the department "did not ignore the law." He told lawmakers on the committee last June that they "solicited the legal guidance on the legal issues that would apply in application in this extraordinary set of circumstances in which the president was seeking to repatriate a servicemember who was in captivity and in peril."
The independent Government Accountability Office, though, declared that the administration violated the law by not notifying Congress in advance of the swap.
All the while, lawmakers have sought a more thorough accounting of the decision.
In a letter to Hagel on June 9 of last year, then-House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon requested all correspondence about the Bergdahl case since January 2012.
On June 11, Hagel told Congress: "We could have done a better job of keeping you informed."
He said that concerns about Bergdahl's health and safety caused them to move quickly, ignoring the 30-day notification requirement.
Eleven months after Bergdahl's release, Republican Hill investigators still do not believe that they have been given all the pertinent information surrounding the Bergdahl swap.

New mayor of Mo. city met by police, suspended over alleged voter fraud

The new mayor of a Missouri city had a tough first day on the job when she was met by police at City Hall and informed she had been suspended over allegations of voter fraud.
Betty McCray, the newly elected mayor of the city of Kinloch, was met in  the parking lot at City Hall Thursday by police officers and the city attorney holding articles of impeachment, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
“You can’t come in as mayor,” attorney James Robinson told McCray. “You have been suspended.”
McCray, however, was defiant, telling Robinson, “You may be the attorney now, but I promise you, you won’t be later.”
The city, located between Ferguson and Lambert St. Louis Airport, has fewer than 300 residents and is plagued by shady land deals and bitter political fights, according to the Post-Dispatch.
“I won. The people spoke,” McCray said, according to MyFox2Now.com. “I was sworn in by the St. Louis County. Today I take office. I want them out, I want the keys.”
Concerns had been raised to the St. Louis County Board of Elections and the Missouri Secretary of State about voters registered in Kinloch who no longer live there.
On April 7, McCray defeated Mayor Darren Small 38 votes to 18.  However, the outgoing administration refused to administer the oath of office to her after the allegations surfaced. She was later sworn in by a St. Louis County court clerk.
The city found that two of the apartments, where six people were registered to vote, were vacant and stripped of furniture and appliances. In one, only a jar of pickles and two used oxygen tanks remained among other debris, the Post-Dispatch reported.
McCray dismissed the allegations as absurd.
“It never came up until I ran for mayor,” McCray said.
This was not the only legal trouble facing the new mayor. In March, the city filed a lawsuit alleging she obtained a house fraudulently from the city in 2008, claiming that former mayor Keith Conway – who served time in prison for charges of wire fraud, theft from a federal program and witness tampering – gave her the house for free. McCray says she bought the four-bedroom house for $9,000.
“I didn’t defraud the city of anything,” McCray told The Post-Dispatch. “They are trying to get those homes back, so they can get the money and put it in their pocket.”
McCray said she intended to file an injunction with the St. Louis County courts, and to return and try to enter City Hall again on Friday.

Huge rally held in support of veteran who prevented flag-walking protest

Protesters at a south Georgia college waved American flags Friday in support of a military veteran issued a criminal trespass warning in a flag flap last week.
Valdosta State University found itself mired in controversy when Air Force veteran Michelle Manhart took an American flag away from a group of student protesters trampling on it. The university fueled the furor when it sided with the students, saying they had a constitutional right to trample the flag in a protest over racism.
Manhart was among the participants in the 90-minute afternoon rally, which took place after Valdosta canceled classes.
The possibility of large numbers of people rallying on the outskirts of campus prompted the university to give students and staff the day off.
"That level of traffic and that many people will disrupt a lot of things in the city," university spokesman Andy Clark said. "We're, from an overall safety perspective, looking to close the campus down today so they can have a peaceful rally."
Manhart said she took action to prevent the flag from being desecrated. Her confrontation with the students was caught on video and went viral.
The trespass warning against her bans her from all university activities, including graduation and football games. She is not a student.
Manhart, who once posed for Playboy, told Fox & Friends before the rally that she hopes the school lets her back on campus.
“I hope they lift the ban because I do support the college,” she said. “I always have and I will continue to support the college. And I hope that once things calm down maybe they’ll reconsider and lift that ban off of me.”
She said the students were wrong.
“To me it’s just a complete disrespect, to not only the men and women that are out there fighting for it but their freedom as a whole,” she said. “In my opinion they don’t have any respect for what they’ve been given and I just don’t think that’s right.”
Organizers of the "Flags Over Valdosta" rally said they expected as many as 4,000 people.
Tensions remained high this week after campus police found a backpack containing a handgun. Police said they traced the gun to a protester who was part of the flag-walking demonstration.
They issued a warrant for Eric Sheppard's arrest on charges of bringing a firearm onto a college campus. Sheppard fled and has not been found by authorities.
His father showed up on campus Thursday issued an appeal for his return.

Obama praises US intelligence day after hostage deaths

President Obama praised the nation’s spying operations Friday calling it the most capable in the world while promising a review aimed at preventing future mistakes, a day after revealing an intelligence failure that killed two Al Qaeda hostages.
 "We all bleed when we lose an American life," Obama said in a speech at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to mark its 10th anniversary. "We all grieve when any innocent life is taken. We don't take this work lightly. And I know that each and every one of you understand the magnitude of what we do and the stakes involved and these aren't abstractions and we're not cavalier about what we do."
Obama said he knows the U.S. intelligence community has faced harsh criticism but can take with great pride that its work has made America work secure. “You do an outstanding job,” he said.
"The world doesn't always see your successes, the threats that you prevent or the terrorist attacks you thwart, or the lives that you save," Obama told intelligence officials gathered in an auditorium at the sprawling gray office building outside Washington. He said their intelligence helped take out Usama bin Laden and other Al Qaeda leaders, showed that Syria had chemical weapons, revealed Russian aggression in Ukraine and supported nuclear negotiations with Iran.
"It's been 10 long and challenging years, but when we look back on those 10 years, the American people have been a whole lot safer," Obama said.
Obama’s praise came one day after the White House announced that a counterterrorism operation in January against an Al Qaeda compound accidentally killed two aid workers being held hostage – American Warren Weinstein and Italian Giovanni Lo Porto. Obama said the U.S. was unaware the hostages were in the targeted position, despite hundreds of hours of surveillance of the compound.
The White House said the attack also killed two American Al Qaeda leaders, Ahmed Farouq and Adam Gadahn, without the U.S knowing in advance they were there. Targeting an American with a drone strike would have triggered a more scrutinized review in consideration of constitutional due process protections.
We're going to review what happened," Obama said Friday. "We're going to identify the lessons that can be learned and any improvements and changes that can be made. And I know those of you who are here share our determination to continue doing everything we can to prevent the loss of innocent lives.
"This self-reflection, this willingness to examine ourselves, to make corrections, to do better, that's part of what makes us Americans. It's part of what sets us apart from other nations," Obama said.
"The United States is the most professional, most capable, most cutting-edge intelligence community in the world," he said, adding that they are sharing more intelligence than ever with partners around the world while tapping new technologies and satellites.
Obama’s speech was planned long before the drone revelation to mark the office’s anniversary, the White House said. The office of the Director of National Intelligence was created by President George W. Bush after the 9/11 attacks to coordinate the vast amounts of intelligence produced by 17 different government organizations, including the CIA, Pentagon, Cabinet departments and other law enforcement agencies.
Obama said Director of National Intelligence James Clapper is one of the first people he sees every day, as Clapper delivers the intelligence report known as the President's Daily Brief. "He gives me his honest assessment, free of politics, free of spin. I trust his integrity and I can't tell you how invaluable that is in the job that he has," Obama said.
Obama said his only complaint is Clapper's habit of leaving paper clips all over the Oval Office as he shuffles through papers. The president then held up a see-through jar of paper clips and said he was returning them. "This will be available to you. The DNI's budget's always a little tight," Obama said.