Billionaire liberal Tom Steyer joins George Soros in backing Florida Dem for governor

Andrew Gillum, mayor of Tallahassee, Fla., is seeking the state's Democratic gubernatorial nomination.  (Facebook)

Florida gubernatorial hopeful Adam Gillum received another big boost Thursday in his bid to win the state’s Democratic nomination.
A second billionaire liberal activist has pledged to support the mayor of Tallahassee as he looks to move from City Hall to the Statehouse.
Gillum, 38, who already has the endorsement of Democratic donor George Soros, has now attracted support from billionaire Tom Steyer as well, the Tampa Bay Times reported Thursday.
Steyer’s NextGen America organization announced Thursday that it has pledged $1 million to Gillum’s campaign, the newspaper reported.
Steyer, 60, is a Californian and former Farallon Capital executive who has appeared in national TV ads calling for the impeachment of President Donald Trump.
“As we battle for the heart and soul of this nation, Andrew Gillum is the kind of leader we need on the front lines,” Steyer said in a written statement late Thursday. “He’s someone we can trust to do the right thing, to put the people before the powerful, and who is unafraid to stand up for justice, now when we need it most.”
The backing from both Soros and Steyer is expected to boost Gillum’s candidacy as he takes on four big-money Democrats in the state’s primary election Aug. 28.
Those other Democrats are former U.S. Rep. Gwen Graham, Palm Beach billionaire Jeff Greene, Orlando businessman Chris King and former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine.
Gillum, the election’s only African-American candidate, frequently reminds crowds that he lacks the financing of his Democratic rivals, Politico reported.
On the Republican side, the two top candidates are Florida Agriculture Commissioner Ada Putnam and U.S. Rep. Ron DeSantis, who sparred Thursday in a debate on Fox News Channel.

Putnam, DeSantis spar over Trump support, shootings in Fox News GOP debate in Florida

Florida Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam and Rep. Ron DeSantis sparred Thursday in Fox News’ Florida Republican gubernatorial debate over their support for President Trump, while DeSantis championed his relationship with the president and Putnam argued he’s more focused on local issues than his opponent.
Putnam, who spent 10 years in Congress before being elected statewide in Florida, used his opening statement to portray DeSantis, elected to Congress in 2012, as a creature of Washington. “What an exciting time to be in front of a live audience of 1,000 Florida Republicans,” Putnam said in his opening remarks. “It's different than a Washington, D.C. studio. Welcome to Florida, congressman.”
DeSantis played up Trump’s endorsement of his campaign, expressing doubt that Putnam adequately supports Trump. “I am proud to have the endorsement of President Trump in this race,” he said.
Added DeSantis, “When Donald Trump was trying to win Florida in 2016, Adam Putnam did not attend a single rally with him. You couldn’t find Adam Putnam if you had a search warrant.”
But Putnam played up his support for Trump, saying, “I support our president's agenda for our country.” He later emphasized: “I am focused on Florida.”
The two candidates took shots at each other throughout the hour-long debate. But on the issues, they both called on Trump to appoint a conservative to the Supreme Court, criticized California Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters for her controversial recent comments and expressed concern over school shootings while defending Second Amendment rights.
Thursday’s debate, moderated by Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum, took place at the Gaylord Palms Resort & Convention Center in Kissimmee ahead of the Aug. 28 primary.
The debate unfolded amid breaking news of the mass shooting at the Capital Gazette newsroom in Annapolis, Maryland, where police said at least five people were killed. The candidates discussed gun control, referencing the recent infamous massacres in Florida at a nightclub and a high school.
FOX NEWS POLL: FLORIDA GOP GUBERNATORIAL PRIMARY
“It is critically important that we defend our rights and protect our students in the schools,” Putnam said. “Those two things are not incompatible.”
“My wife and I have two young kids under the age of two,” DeSantis said. “The thought that someone would come and shoot them fills me with rage.”
Both called for the removal of Scott Israel, the sheriff of Broward County who came under criticism after the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland in February.
“I would have removed that sheriff from Broward County. He failed his citizens and he should have been removed,” DeSantis said.
“Sheriff Israel is under investigation and he needs to go,” Putnam said.
Thursday’s televised showdown is part of Fox News’ series of debates leading up to the 2018 midterm elections.
Though Trump endorsed DeSantis, a recent Fox News poll of Florida likely GOP primary voters finds Putnam ahead of DeSantis by a 32-17 percent margin. However, 39 percent of voters said they're unsure who they will back in the primary. Meanwhile, 46 percent of those supporting a candidate say they could still change their mind.
Meanwhile, there’s a crowded Democratic primary for governor, including Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum, Palm Beach billionaire Jeff Greene, former U.S. Rep. Gwen Graham, Orlando businessman Chris King and former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine.
The current governor of Florida, Republican Rick Scott, is challenging incumbent Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson for the Senate.

Obama immigration Cartoons

DHS formally asks Pentagon to house 12,000 migrant family members

The Department of Homeland Security on Thursday formally requested that the Department of Defense help house and care for 12,000 migrant family members and locate potential facility locations.
The Pentagon was asked to locate appropriate facilities and — when necessary — construct semi-separate, soft-sided camp facilities in Arizona, New Mexico, California and Texas.
On Sunday, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said the military has housed people in the past, including Vietnamese fleeing their country as well as Americans needing shelter in the wake of natural disasters.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis  (Associated Press)

HHS has assessed facilities on four military bases: Little Rock Air Force Base in
Arkansas, plus three bases in Texas: Dyess Air Force Base, Goodfellow Air Force Base and Fort Bliss.
The DHS request for the Pentagon to house comes a week after the Defense Department was asked to house up to 20,000 unaccompanied alien migrant children. All told, the Pentagon has now been asked to house 32,000 migrants, 2,000 beginning in the next 45 days.
An administration official tells Fox News the migrant families will be housed at Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas. The migrant children will be housed at Goodfellow Air Force Base, roughly 400 miles to the east in central Texas.

Stormy Daniels' lawyer, Michael Avenatti, also represents planned pot farm: report

His soon to be ex wife.

Before he gained media attention for representing an X-rated film star in a lawsuit against the president of the United States, attorney Michael Avenatti spent a lot of time working for a company that plans to build an indoor cannabis farm and processing plant in the California desert.
In fact, in much of 2017 it was not unusual for Avenatti to write emails and attend public meetings on behalf of Desert Harvest Development LLC, which expects to employee more than 500 people and generate more than $14 million in tax revenue for the city of Desert Hot Springs, if the plan is approved, the Desert Sun reported.
So in early 2018, when the same Avenatti began making regular appearances on cable TV, arguing on behalf of Stephanie Clifford (aka Stormy Daniels) in a lawsuit against President Donald Trump, many people in the small city were surprised.
“It was a little bit of a shocker when we saw him on the national news,” Doria Wilms, a Desert Hot Springs city spokeswoman, told the Desert Sun. “But it didn’t take away from the fact that he is one of many projects here in the city, and we want his project to be developed just like we want everybody else’s.”
But although Desert Harvest’s plans received city approval in November 2017, the company has not yet purchased the 65-acre parcel of land it eyed for the complex, the newspaper reported.
It added that Avenatti wrote in an email that the company intends to purchase the land soon and still intends to proceed with the venture.
Meanwhile, Fox News previously reported that Avenatti’s personal business dealings have come under scrutiny in recent months. Fox News confirmed in May that Avenatti was under investigation by the California State Bar over allegations related to his stewardship of the bankrupt Tully’s Coffee chain. The ownership group, Global Baristas LLC faced a lien for unpaid federal taxes worth approximately $5 million.
Avenatti has also claimed that the tax lien in question "is related to an entity that was owned by another company that I used to have an interest in." He told Fox News, "At no point in time was I ever responsible for any taxes for Global Baristas US LLC, nor was I ever a member of that entity, nor did I own any direct interest in that entity."
Court records detail Avenatti’s extravagant lifestyle, with monthly expenses running to about $40,000. He’s a noted collector of watches and artwork, uses a private jet to travel, and leases expensive cars, his wife claimed in case documents. Lisa Storie-Avenatti has suggested he was avoiding their divorce proceedings.

Ex-Clinton adviser blasts Hillary's 'miserable' outreach to evangelicals

Hillary Clinton did a "miserable" job of reaching out to white evangelical voters in the 2016 presidential election, so the next Democratic nominee needs to "be better" in 2020, a former adviser to President Bill Clinton said recently.
Matthew Bennett, founder of the Third Way think tank that sees itself as a champion of "modern center-left ideas," shared his views in Washington last weekend at the Michael Cromartie Forum, hosted by the Ethics and Public Policy Center, the Christian Post reported.
Exit polls indicated that Hillary Clinton captured just 16 percent of the white evangelical vote in 2016, compared to Barack Obama's 21 percent in 2012 and 24 percent in 2008, the report noted.
In Bennett's view, Democrats erred in trying to craft different messages for different constituencies, rather than "craft a narrative that can be broadly useful" with all voters.
"When I worked for Bill Clinton," Bennett said, "he would say everywhere, 'If you work hard and play by the rules, you should get a fair shake.' He would say that every single place he went, no matter what he was doing.
"Hillary said a different thing in every place she went and she was nuanced and she was sophisticated and it was a disaster."
In addition, Bennett asserted that Democrats hurt themselves with faith-based voters by being "two ticks too far" ahead of the public on issues such as transgender rights. He said Democrats were previously ahead of the public on same-sex marriage, but that is no longer the case.

"Hillary said a different thing in every place she went and she was nuanced and she was sophisticated and it was a disaster."

But while Bennett sees outreach to religious voters as a strong possibility for Democrats as they head into 2020, one black Democrat Christian strategist argued earlier this month that the party's "secular progressivism" remained a source of alienation for many black Christians.
Justin Giboney, an Atlanta lawyer and former Obama delegate to the Democratic National Convention, said June 18 during a panel discussion at Georgetown University that in his experience, black candidates who expressed their biblical views were "completely demolished by the liberal establishment" if those views differed from the secular progressive "box."
"The message to the black community ... was 'Know your place'," Giboney said. "'We want your votes but we don't want you in office if you hold certain types of beliefs.'
"If that is the Democratic Party that we are going to have, they are going to run into troubles."

Pelosi on Ocasio-Cortez's win: They made a choice in 1 district

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D- Calif., on Wednesday appeared to downplay the ramifications of Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez’s stunning victory in New York’s 14th Congressional District, saying voters went for the left-of-left candidate in one district and the outcome was not the seismic shift portrayed in the media.
“The fact that in a very progressive district in New York, it went more progressive — and (incumbent Rep.) Joe Crowley is a progressive — but to the left of Joe Crowley is about that district,” Pelosi said. “It is not to be viewed as something that stands for everything else.”
Crowley's loss to a Democratic socialist was considered a shocking defeat. He'd been considered a contender for speaker if Democrats retook the House in the November midterms.
President Donald Trump on Wednesday told a rally in Fargo, N.D., that one of his "biggest critics, a slovenly man, Joe Crowley, got his ass kicked by a young woman who had a lot of energy."
Trump appeared pleased with Tuesday night’s primary results and appeared dead set on promoting Pelosi and Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., as the faces of the Democratic Party.
Pelosi was asked Wednesday about the Republican notion that socialism was afoot in her party and she denied the theory.
“It’s ascendent in that district, perhaps. But I don’t accept any characterization of our party presented by the Republicans. So let me reject that right now. Our party is a big tent, our districts are very different, one from the other,” she said.
The issues that Ocasio-Cortez ran on included expanding the Medicare program to people of all ages and abolishing U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
“We beat a machine with a movement, and that is what we have done today,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “Working-class Americans want a clear champion and there is nothing radical about moral clarity in 2018.”
The New York Times editorial page said that Ocasio-Cortez’s victory was “a vivid sign of the changing of the guard.”
“What remains to be seen, though, is whether Democratic leaders will embrace these newcomers or see them as a threat,” the paper wrote. “That may determine whether Democrats are able to take back the House of Representatives in November.”

2018 Democratic Primary Cartoons

Red Hen owner resigns from Virginia business group after booting Sarah Sanders from restaurant

Stephanie Wilkinson, a co-owner of Red Hen, responsible for kicking White House press secretary Sarah Sanders and her family out of a Virginia restaurant on Friday evening, is stepping aside from leadership of a local business group. (Facebook)

The owner of the Virginia restaurant responsible for kicking White House press secretary Sarah Sanders and her family out on Friday evening is stepping aside from leadership of a local business group.
Stephanie Wilkinson stepped down as an executive director of Main Street Lexington, an organization tasked with promoting economic viability, Fox News has learned.
Elizabeth Outland Branner, the president of the organization, accepted Wilkinson’s resignation Tuesday morning, WSLS reported.
“Considering the events of the past weekend, Stephanie felt it best that for the continued success of Main Street Lexington, she should step aside,” Branner wrote in an email.
The Washington Times reported that the volunteer-based organization “exists to enhance the economic prosperity and cultural vitality of our community, re-establishing downtown Lexington as the vibrant economic and cultural nexus of our area while maintaining its unique character,” according to its homepage. The group, established in 2013, is affiliated with the Virginia Main Street Program, which seeks to promote “economic revitalization in the context of historic preservation.”
As Fox News previously reported, Wilkinson told The Washington Post that she felt compelled to take a stand, citing what she called the Trump White House’s “inhumane and unethical” actions.
“I’m not a huge fan of confrontation,” Wilkinson told The Post. “I have a business, and I want the business to thrive.” But, she went on to say, “This feels like the moment in our democracy when people have to make uncomfortable actions and decisions to uphold their morals.”
“Last night I was told by the owner of Red Hen in Lexington, VA to leave because I work for @POTUS and I politely left,” Sanders tweeted on Saturday. “Her actions say far more about her than about me. I always do my best to treat people, including those I disagree with, respectfully and will continue to do so.”
President Trump also weighed in on the controversy Monday morning with a scathing tweet about the restaurant.
“The Red Hen Restaurant should focus more on cleaning its filthy canopies, doors and windows (badly needs a paint job) rather than refusing to serve a fine person like Sarah Huckabee Sanders,” Trump tweeted. “I always had a rule, if a restaurant is dirty on the outside, it is dirty on the inside!”

Primaries bring good news for Trump and Republicans, bad news for divided Democrats

Primaries Tuesday showed the power of President Trump’s endorsements continued to help Republican candidates triumph, while House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., lost a key lieutenant – Rep. Joe Crowley – in a New York City race that suggests internal divisions among Democrats are more serious than people might think.
In addition, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, the 2012 GOP presidential nominee who lost to President Obama, staged a political comeback by easily winning the Republican nomination for a U.S. Senate seat in Utah held by the retiring Republican Orrin Hatch. Romney seems headed for victory in November in the heavily Republican state.
Democratic divisions between the leftist insurgents who backed Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont in his unsuccessful campaign against Hillary Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016 make it less likely that a big, blue wave is coming that will sweep Democrats to majority control in the House and Senate.
The insurgents have the potential to change the Democratic Party over the long term into something more in line with left-leaning parties in Europe, rather than continuing to remain within the uniquely American spectrum where both parties agree to one degree or another that market forces should continue to play a role in setting economic policy.
President Trump’s job approval numbers are holding steady somewhere in the mid-40s. The percentage of voters who feel the country is on the right track is now up near 40 percent – double where it was at the beginning of the year.
The only way this feels like it’s a “change election” is on the Democratic side, where younger voters and women seemed determined to “Bernie-fy” the party and have it stand for such things as rolling back the Trump tax cuts, free college for all, Medicare for all and – in essence – a transformation of the United States into a full-blown version of a European-style welfare state.
That pitch might work in the big cities, which seem to be the only power base the party of the Clintons and Obama has left. But it’s not clear that voters in the suburbs and rural areas will vote for candidates on the far left.
And, thanks to the recent outburst from liberal entertainers and U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters – who has urged those on the left to harass Trump administration officials wherever they might be found – the Democrats may be in the process of losing whatever advantage they might have had on the civility question. That might actually be one place where President Trump is truly vulnerable.
In New York City, voters in 56-year-old Democratic Rep. Crowley’s Queens congressional district tossed him out in favor Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old former Bernie Sanders organizer. Ocasio-Cortez represents both a generational and ideological shift in one of the city’s more moderate boroughs.
The defeat of Crowley, the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus and a potential successor to Pelosi, suggests the divisions between the older liberals currently running the party and young insurgents who transferred their allegiance from President Obama to Bernie Sanders in 2016 may be deeper and more permanent that many analysts believed. That spells bad news for Democrats in the November election.
In addition to the surprise defeat of Crowley in New York, a closely watched race in the state saw the winner of a House Republican primary on New York City’s Staten Island helped by an endorsement from President Trump. Rep. Dan Donovan, who had the president’s backing, defeated former GOP Rep. Michael Grimm. Grimm’s campaign – claiming his conviction on tax fraud charges that forced his resignation from Congress was the result of a kind of “deep state” conspiracy – proved unpersuasive.
In New York’s 24^th Congressional District near Syracuse, Democrats nominated Syracuse University Professor Dana Balter as their candidate against Republican Rep. John Katko. While New York Republicans are thought to be an endangered species, Katko – who won re-election to second term in 2016 with 61 percent of the vote – is the only one occupying a district carried by Hillary Clinton in the presidential electioni.
In other primary results:
UTAH
Romney’s nomination is interesting, as pundits – at least those on the GOP side – say he’s running to become the voice of opposition to Trump from within the party. That would mean taking over the role now played by Arizona Republican Senators Jeff Flake, who is retiring after a single term, and John McCain, who battling brain cancer.
Even if that’s true, that’s a dubious proposition. Romney was never as intrinsically popular among Republicans who supported him as Trump is among his supporters.
Any love the Republican rank and file felt for Romney was based on his winning the nomination to go up against President Obama, whom Republicans greatly desired to see beaten.
The former Massachusetts governor may think he has some kind of moral authority that can act as a temporizer to President Trump’s excesses, but that’s only if his audience is the New York Times, CNN and the rich elites who accepted him as one of their own in a way they will never accept Trump.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Republican South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, who was endorsed by President Trump, turned back a challenge from businessman and first-time candidate John Warren to win the GOP nomination for governor in a runoff.
McMaster – who was lieutenant governor until he replaced Gov. Nikki Haley when she became America’s U.N. ambassador – was one of the first statewide elected officials anywhere in America to endorse Donald Trump for president. The president repaid the favor by traveling to the state for a last-minute “get out the vote” rally for McMaster Monday night.
MARYLAND
In Maryland, former NAACP President Ben Jealous defeated Prince George’s County Executive Rushern Baker and will face GOP Gov. Larry Hogan in the fall. Jealous promised to run a Sanders-like campaign against the popular Hogan, who the polls indicate is an early favorite for re-election. This makes him something of a rarity in the heavily Democratic state.
In the contest for U.S. Senate in Maryland, incumbent Democrat Ben Cardin easily won re-nomination against six opponents, including Chelsea Manning, a former U.S. Army solider convicted of leaking sensitive information and later pardoned by President Obama after serving seven years of a 35-year sentence.
MISSISSIPPI
In Mississippi, Democrat David Baria emerged from the runoff as the winner for the right to take on Republican incumbent U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker in the November election in something akin to a quixotic challenge.
In the state’s 3^rd Congressional District, Republican Michael Guest defeated Whit Hughes in the runoff for the seat held by retiring GOP U.S. Rep. Greg Harper.
COLORADO
In Colorado, progressive Democratic multi-millionaire Jared Polis and Republican Walker Stapleton, a member of the Bush political dynasty, will face off against one another in the race for governor.
In the race for Polis’ open congressional seat the Democrats nominated attorney Joe Neguse, whose campaign relied heavily on his life story – he is the son of African refugees – to make a personal connection with voters.
In the state’s 6^th Congressional District, conservative GOP Rep. Doug Lamborn beat back four challengers to win renomination for a seventh term representing the residents of Colorado Springs and its environs.
OKLAHOMA
In Oklahoma, Republican former Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett and former state Attorney General Drew Edmondson emerged from a multi-candidate field to win their respective party nominations for governor.
In the heavily Republican 1^st Congressional District in Tulsa, the GOP’s Tim Harris won the nomination in the race to follow former Rep. Jim Bridenstine, now the NASA administrator, into Congress.
Overall, the primaries Tuesday saw few surprises – with the exception of Crowley’s stunning upset – and saw no clear trends emerging save for the continued popularity of President Trump among Republicans in Republican areas.