Draining the Swamp Cartoons

Crackdown on MS-13 gang nets more than 200 arrests

More than 200 MS-13 gang members were arrested in a major sweep called "Operation Raging Bull," the Trump administration announced Thursday.  (Reuters)

Underscoring its promise earlier this year to crack down on a brutal gang, the Trump adminstration on Thursday announced the arrests of dozens of members of MS-13.

“Operation Raging Bull,” conducted Oct. 8-Nov. 11 across the United States, resulted in 214 arrests, officials said.

The operation was led by the Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) unit of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), in conjunction with local and federal officials.
It was the second phase of a two-part operation. Authorities made 53 arrests in Venezuela in September after an 18-month investigation.
"We will not rest until every member, associate and leader of MS-13 has been held accountable for their crimes," said Thomas Horman, director of ICE.
More than 1,200 gang members have been convicted so far this year, and about 4,000 have been arrested and charged, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement.
Sessions promised an all-out assault on the violent gang last month, designating it a "priority" for the Department of Justice's Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force.
“They leave misery, devastation and death in their wake. They threaten entire governments. They must be and will be stopped," the attorney general said in Philadelphia last month.
In the most recent roundup, charges included murder, aggravated robbery, racketeering, narcotics trafficking, firearms offenses and assault, with roughly 60 arrests being illegal border crossings by unaccompanied children, officials said.
The gang originated in Los Angeles in the 1980s, then entrenched itself in Central America when its leaders were deported.
MS-13’s motto is “mata, viola, controla” – which means "kill, rape, control," according to Robert Hur, a Justice Department official.

Mueller subpoenas Trump campaign for Russia-related documents, source says

Letting the Alligators run the swamp? 

Robert Mueller's investigators subpoenaed more than a dozen Trump campaign officials requesting Russia-related documents last month.  (REUTERS/Joshua Roberts)

Special counsel Robert Mueller's investigators have subpoenaed the Trump campaign for documents from a number of people as part of his probe of Russian interference in last year's election campaign, a source with knowledge of the investigation told Fox News late Thursday.

The subpoena, which was issued last month, was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.

The Journal reported that the special counsel's office is seeking documents and emails from more than a dozen campaign officials that reference certain Russia-related keywords. The paper described it as Mueller's first official order for the Trump campaign to produce information.
The source described the subpoena to Fox as a "cleanup operation" aimed at collecting any missing information and ensuring that Mueller had the same documents as the three congressional committees conducting their own investigations.
Separately, the top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee said earlier Thursday that White House Senior Adviser Jared Kushner -- President Trump's son-in-law -- hasn't been fully forthcoming with the panel's probe into Russian election interference, asking him to provide emails sent to him involving WikiLeaks and a "Russian backdoor overture and dinner invite."
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., sent a letter to Kushner's lawyer saying the collection of documents he has provided the committee is "incomplete." The committee gave Kushner a Nov. 27 deadline to provide the additional documents, including the emails and Kushner's security clearance form that originally omitted certain contacts with Russian officials.
The senators noted they have received documents from other campaign officials that were copied to or forwarded to Kushner, but which he did not produce. Those include "September 2016 email communications to Mr. Kushner concerning WikiLeaks." Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., corresponded with WikiLeaks that month and, according to The Atlantic, sent an email to several Trump campaign advisers to tell them about it.
Grassley and Feinstein wrote that other parties have produced documents concerning a "Russian backdoor overture and dinner invite" that Kushner forwarded but has not given to the committee. It is unclear what overture and dinner invite they are referring to.
The senators are also asking Kushner for correspondence with former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who is a subject of an investigation by Mueller.
Abbe Lowell, Kushner's lawyer, said in a statement that Kushner has been "responsive to all requests."
"We provided the Judiciary Committee with all relevant documents that had to do with Mr. Kushner's calls, contacts or meetings with Russians during the campaign and transition, which was the request," Lowell said. "We also informed the committee we will be open to responding to any additional requests and that we will continue to work with White House Counsel for any responsive documents from after the inauguration."
The new request is a sign that the panel is still moving forward with its probe into the Russian interference and whether Trump's campaign was involved.
In the letter to Kushner, the senators noted they had asked him to provide documents to, from, or copied to him "relating to" certain individuals of interest to investigators, but Kushner responded that no emails had been found in which those individuals were sent emails, received emails, or were copied on them.
"If, as you suggest, Mr. Kushner was unaware of, for example, any attempts at Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, then presumably there would be few communications concerning many of the persons identified in our second request, and the corresponding burden of searching would be small," the senators wrote.
The committee also asked for the additional documents related to Flynn, detailing a long list of search terms, and rebuffed Kushner's lawyer's arguments that his security clearance is confidential and unavailable because it has been submitted to the FBI for review.
The Senate and House intelligence committees interviewed Kushner in July. The Judiciary panel has also sought an interview with Kushner, but his lawyers offered to make the transcripts available from the other interviews instead, according to the letter. The senators say those panels haven't provided them with those transcripts, and ask Lowell to secure that access.
Then "we will consider whether the transcript satisfies the needs of our investigation," Grassley and Feinstein wrote.

Bill Clinton should have resigned after Lewinsky affair, New York Democrat says

U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., listens to testimony on Capitol Hill in Washington, Jan. 28, 2009.  (Associated Press)

Recent news about prominent men facing allegations of sexual misconduct apparently has some Democrats reassessing the presidency of Bill Clinton.

The second-guessers include at least one Democrat who has long been considered a Clinton supporter.

On Thursday, U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., asserted that, in retrospect, Clinton should have resigned from the presidency after the disclosure of his extramarital affair with intern Monica Lewinsky.
“Yes, I think that is the appropriate response,” Gillibrand told the New York Times, when asked if Clinton should have left the White House.

"Yes, I think that is the appropriate response."

- U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., on whether President Bill Clinton should have resigned.

Gillibrand’s remarks were reported on the same day that House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and other prominent lawmakers from both sides of the aisle on Capitol Hill called for U.S. Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., to face a Senate ethics investigation into his 2006 conduct with a Los Angeles radio host during a USO tour.
On Thursday, Gillibrand announced that she would donate $12,500 she received from Franken’s political action committee to Protect Our Defenders, a group working to end rape and sexual assault in the U.S. armed forces, the Hill reported.
Gillibrand’s comments Thursday made her the most prominent Democrat to link this year’s increasingly low tolerance for mistreatment of women to the Clinton years. The senator noted, however, that sexual misconduct was regarded less harshly in the 1990s than today.
The senator added that perhaps President Donald Trump’s past behavior and comments about women also deserve more scrutiny.
“And I think in light of this conversation, we should have a very different conversation about President Trump, and a very different conversation about allegations against him,” she said.
Gillibrand has been a U.S. senator since 2009, after serving in the U.S. House of Representatives.
On Wednesday, Gillibrand and U.S. Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Calif., introduced legislation to improve the prevention and reporting of sexual harassment on Capitol Hill, PBS NewsHour reported.

Senate panel OKs tax bill, drawing Trump, GOP closer to major legislative win

The Senate Finance Committee voted late Thursday in favor of the House GOP tax bill, paving the way for the first major legislative victory for the Trump administration.

The panel's 14-12 vote means the bill will likely reach the Senate floor sometime after Thanksgiving.

Earlier Thursday, the House passed its bill in a 227-205 vote.
"For the millions of hard-working Americans who need more money in their pockets and the chance of a better future, help is on the way," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a statement.

"For the millions of hard-working Americans who need more money in their pockets and the chance of a better future, help is on the way."

“When the Senate returns after Thanksgiving, I will bring this must-pass legislation to the floor for further debate and open consideration," he added.
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), slightly altered by Finance Committee Chairman and U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, during the four-day markup, would temporarily cut taxes for individuals and ax the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent.
It would also include a repeal of the Affordable Care Act's individual mandate, adding an estimated $338 billion in revenue over 10 years. Earlier this year, Republicans failed to repeal the ACA, the 2010 health care measure commonly called ObamaCare.
“This is a good bill that delivers on our promise to provide middle-class tax relief and grow our economy,” Hatch told reporters before the Senate panel's vote, according to the Hill.
The earlier House vote drew praise on Twitter from President Donald Trump. “Big win today in the House for GOP Tax Cuts and Reform, 227-205. Zero Dems, they want to raise taxes much higher, but not for our military!” Trump tweeted.
Republicans celebrated the potential tax overhaul, claiming it would support the middle class in America, and denied Democratic Party lawmakers' accusations that the bill favors the wealthy and big corporations and will potentially leave millions of Americans without health insurance.
“I come from the poor people," said Hatch, 83, who was the first member of his family to attend college. "And I’ve been working my whole stinking career for people who don’t have a chance. And I really resent anybody saying I’m just doing this for the rich. Give me a break.”
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., meanwhile, called the bill “indefensible, partisan legislation," the Hill reported. Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., said the bill was “flawed.”
"It’s not surprising that a flawed process has produced a flawed product, but we can change course," Carper said in a statement, according to Business Insider. "I implore Chairman Hatch and our colleagues on the other side of the aisle: Let’s go back to the drawing board and start anew on a real bipartisan basis."