A large group of demonstrators gathered outside the Statehouse in Trenton, N.J., on Thursday to protest a controversial bill that would remove religion as a legal reason for parents not vaccinating public school students.
The
bill passed the state House last month but stalled in the Senate. But
senators reportedly reached a deal Thursday that is expected to result
in Senate approval on Monday, reports said.
The proposal would then head to Gov. Phil Murphy, a Democrat who hasn't been clear about whether he backs the plan or not.
The
latest development came despite some 1,000 "anti-vaxx" protesters
showing up Thursday. Many shouted “Kill the bill!” after a Republican,
state Sen. Declan O’Scanlon, who had called for an amendment to give
parents who choose not to vaccinate their children another choice
besides homeschooling, agreed to cast the deciding vote in favor of it.
Parents
who don't allow their children to be vaccinated can send them to
private school and daycare, O'Scanlon said, adding that another
amendment says public schools must accept an unvaccinated child if
there’s evidence a vaccine harmed one of their siblings.
“I think we need to do all we can to maximize vaccine compliance,” O'Scanlon added.
“I think we need to do all we can to maximize vaccine compliance.” — New Jersey state Sen. Declan O’Scanlon
Some
protesters shouted “Murderer!” and “Traitor!” from inside the Senate
gallery as lawmakers voted 18-15 to approve the amendments.
“This
type of amendment will once again allow the wealthy to buy their way out
of a law via private schools,” Sue Collins, co-founder of the New
Jersey Coalition for Vaccination Choice told NJ.com. “Unless you have enough money, your religious beliefs are not valid.”
“This
type of amendment will once again allow the wealthy to buy their way
out of a law via private schools. Unless you have enough money, your
religious beliefs are not valid.” — Sue Collins, co-founder, New Jersey Coalition for Vaccination Choice
Andrea
Kelly chooses not to vaccinate her children and protested Thursday
because she said she can’t afford to send her children to a private
school.
Beata Savreski, the mother of three boys, drove to the capital for the first time to make her voice heard.
“I want to preserve our rights as parents,” she said.
Republican state Sen. Gerald Cardinale called the bill “a deliberate attack on religious freedom.”
State
Senate President Stephen Sweeney, a Democrat, said the bill is a
“public health issue” and said he expects it to pass on Monday when the
chamber reconvenes.
“We’re
either going to get it done now or we’re going to get it done in the
next session, but by all means this is getting done,” Sweeney told NorthJersey.com. “It’s
the right health care policy and it’s based on science, unlike what
[the protesters are] chanting and saying. They have a right to their
opinion.”
It’s not the first time the protesters have voiced their
disapproval. They came out to the Statehouse in large numbers when the
state Assembly passed the bill last month.
The bill was prompted by a recent outbreak of measles in New Jersey.
More than 1,200 cases of measles were reported in 31 states in 2019, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.
If Murphy signs the bill into law, it would take effect six months later.
Flush with campaign cash and facing down a possible Senate impeachment trial, President Trump headlined his first major rally of the election year Thursday in Ohio -- and almost immediately, the president capitalized on his order to take out Iranian
commander Qassem Soleimani after the military leader was said to have
orchestrated an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Iraq.
In unequivocal terms, Trump slammed House Democrats' nonbinding War Powers Resolution, which passed earlier in the day in a rebuke to the Soleimani strike. Trump went on to suggest that Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and "Liddle' pencil-neck"
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., would have
tipped off the media about the operation had they known about it.
"They're
saying, 'You should get permission from Congress, you should come in
and tell us what you want to do -- you should come in and tell us, so
that we can call up the fake news that's back there, and we can leak
it,'" Trump said. "Lot of corruption back there."
The president
added that it would have been impractical to have alerted Congress,
given the "split-second" nature of the decision to kill Soleimani.
Separately,
Trump said he hoped former Vice President Joe Biden would become the
Democrats' presidential nominee, and pledged he would highlight what he
called the Bidens' corruption all throughout the campaign.
"He
will hear, 'Where's Hunter?',' every single debate nine times at the
podium," Trump vowed, in reference to Biden's son, who largely has
stayed out of public view after it emerged that he held lucrative
overseas board roles while his father was vice president.
Republicans have accused Hunter Biden, who recently was determined to have fathered a child with an Arkansas ex-stripper, of selling access to his father.
Trump was speaking before a packed crowd
in Toledo after apparently pulling back from the brink of war with Iran
earlier this week, and just hours after officials announced that Iran likely shot down a civilian airliner carrying
dozens of Canadians, apparently by mistake. Canadian Prime Minister
Justin Trudeau suggested the U.S. might bear responsibility, and he declined to condemn Iran.
For the most part, the rally focused on the Iran strike and the response to it from the political left.
"The
radical left Democrats have expressed outrage over the termination of
this horrible terrorist," Trump said. "Instead, they should be outraged
by Soleimani's savage crimes and the fact that his countless victims
were denied justice for so long."
Trump said he had acted swiftly
after the earlier attack at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and essentially
overruled a commander who said the military response would not arrive
until the next day. The situation, Trump said, easily could have become
"another Benghazi" -- a reference to the deadly 2012 attack at the U.S.
consulate in Libya.
"I said, 'nope, get in the planes right now,
have them there immediately!'" Trump said. "And, they got there
immediately. ... If you dare threaten our citizens, you do so at your
own grave peril."
Former President Obama, Trump added, had erred
by giving billions to Iran as part of the mostly defunct Iran nuclear
deal, including a massive cash payout loaded onto U.S. aircraft.
"By
subsidizing Iran's maligned conduct, the last administration was
leading the world down the path of war," Trump said. "We are restoring
our world to the path of peace, peace through strength."
The
campaign event offered Trump an opportunity to spotlight before a
friendly crowd his decision to order the deadly drone strike
against Soleimani, while keeping the U.S. -- at least for the moment --
out of a wider military conflict.
Trump also emphasized the booming economy, including a strong stock market and historically low unemployment rates.
"Unemployment
has reached the lowest level in over 51 years," Trump said.
"African-American, Hispanic American and Asian American unemployment
have all reached the lowest rates ever, ever, ever recorded. Wages are
rising fast, and the biggest percentage increase -- makes me happy --
are for blue-collar workers. Forty million American families are now
benefiting from the Republican child-tax credit, each receiving an
average of over $2,200 a year."
Trump added that getting rid of
"job-killing regulations" had helped spur the industrial sector. He
later invoked the destructive and widespread "yellow vest" protests in
France, which had started out of frustration with high taxes on gas.
"If you dare threaten our citizens, you do so at your own grave peril." — President Trump
"America
lost 60,000 factories under the previous administration ... They're all
coming back," Trump said. "And, right now, just in a very short period
of time, we've added 12,000 brand new factories and many more are coming
in."
The United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement [USMCA], Trump
said, would improve the economy further and make the U.S. automobile
industry in particular more competitive.
The Democrats' policies,
Trump argued, have produced chaos and poverty. Trump specifically ripped
Pelosi, D-Calif., for living in a mansion in San Francisco, even as her
"disgusting" district filled with homeless people defecating on the
streets.
Trump additionally touted the recent appellate court ruling
that green-lit funding for his border wall, slammed "late-term abortion
and ripping babies right from the mother's womb right up until the
mother's womb," and highlighted Obama's broken promise to ensure
Americans could keep their doctors under his health-care plan.
"We will protect patients with preexisting conditions, and we will protect your preexisting physician," Trump vowed.
The
president's reelection campaign already had used Facebook ads to
highlight Trump’s decision to strike Soleimani, regarded as Iran’s
second-most-powerful official.
"We caught a total monster, and we
took him out, and that should have happened a long time ago,” Trump said
before departing Washington earlier in the day.
Last week’s
killing of Soleimani brought long-simmering tensions between the U.S.
and Iran to a boil. Iran, in retaliation, fired a barrage of missiles
this week at two military bases in neighboring Iraq that have housed
hundreds of U.S. troops. But, with no reported injuries to U.S. or Iraqi
troops, Trump said he had no plans to take further military action
against Iran and instead would enact more sanctions against the Islamic
Republic.
The Iran crisis, which momentarily overshadowed Trump's
looming impeachment trial, also has opened a new front in the 2020
presidential campaign for Trump, who in 2016 campaigned in part on a
promise to end American involvement in "endless wars."
Trump
entered the election year flush with over $100 million in campaign
cash, a low unemployment rate and an unsettled field of Democrats
seeking to challenge him. Yet, polling showed he remained vulnerable.
Back
in December, an AP-NORC poll showed Trump's approval rating at 40
percent. No more recent major polls have emerged to gauge support for
the president in the wake of the targeted killing of Soleimani, though
opinions of Trump have changed little over the course of his presidency.
Trump
has never fallen into historic lows for a president’s approval ratings,
but Gallup polling showed his December rating registered lower than
that of most recent presidents at the same point in their first terms.
Notably, approval of Trump and Obama in the Decembers before their
reelection bids was roughly the same.
For Trump to win reelection,
securing Ohio's 18 electoral votes will be critical. He won Ohio by
eight points in 2016, after Obama held the state in 2008 and 2012. The
visit to Toledo marked Trump's 15th appearance in Ohio as president.
Trump
has anchored his reelection messaging around a solid national economy
with an unemployment rate of 3.5 percent. But, people in parts of the
industrial Midwest have said they've been left behind, especially as the
manufacturing sector has struggled over the past year in response to
slower worldwide economic growth and trade tensions with China.
Labor
Department figures showed construction and factory jobs slumping in
Ohio. In nearby Michigan, manufacturers were shedding workers as well,
but so were that state’s employers in the health care, education and
social assistance sectors.
But, the Toledo area pointed at an even
more alarming trend in an otherwise healthy economy. The Glass City has
shedded over 6 percent of its white-collar jobs in the professional and
business services sector over the past year, causing the total number
of jobs to slump slightly from a year ago.
As an incumbent, Trump
has been able to use his position to build a massive campaign cash
reserve at a time when Democrats have been raising and spending theirs
in a competitive primary. Although many White House hopefuls, most
notably Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and former South Bend, Ind., Mayor
Pete Buttigieg, have pulled in massive sums, there has been no clear
front-runner, and many party officials have been girding for a
protracted contest that could further bleed the eventual nominee of
resources.
Trump,
meanwhile, raised $46 million in the final quarter of 2019 and had over
$102 million cash on hand at the end of the year. The Republican
National Committee [RNC], which hasn’t faced as strict a set of
contribution limits as the candidate, raised even more. Under the
current rules, the RNC won’t have to release its December fundraising
numbers until the end of the month.
Asked how much he was willing
to spend on his reelection, Trump said, "I literally haven't even
thought about it." He added: "I will say this: Because of the
impeachment hoax, we're taking in numbers that nobody ever expected. You
saw the kind of numbers we're reporting. We're blowing everybody away." Fox News' Andrew O'Reilly and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
U.S. Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., became the target of social media trolls and other critics – including Donald Trump Jr. – on Thursday for his abrupt reversal regarding when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should deliver articles of impeachment to the U.S. Senate.
Early
Thursday, Smith said he believed Pelosi was looking to establish
negotiating leverage with the Senate by withholding the two articles of
impeachment against President Trump, which the House approved last
month. The articles charge the president with abuse of power and
obstruction of Congress in relation to a July phone call with the
president of Ukraine.
But ultimately, Smith said, he believed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., was in charge of the Senate and should determine that body’s course of action regarding a Trump impeachment trial.
“I
think it was perfectly advisable for the speaker to try to leverage
that to get a better deal,” Smith told CNN, but adding “at this point,
it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.”
“I think it is time
to send the impeachment to the Senate and let Mitch McConnell be
responsible for the fairness of the trial,” Smith said. “He ultimately
is.”
But just a short time later, Smith posted on Twitter what seemed to be a complete reversal from the statements he made on TV.
“I
misspoke this morning,” Smith wrote. “I do believe we should do
everything we can to force the Senate to have a fair trial. If the
Speaker believes that holding on to the articles for a longer time will
help force a fair trial in the Senate, then I wholeheartedly support
that decision.”
Critics quickly took note of the sudden retreat by
Smith, the 54-year-old chairman of the House Armed Services Committee,
and suggested that perhaps he was surrendering to pressure from
Democratic Party leaders.
“Hahahaha someones not allowed to think
for himself and got in trouble for breaking with Nancy’s narrative,”
Donald Trump Jr. wrote. “This has been the problem with the sham
impeachment from day one, no one actually believes this BS except for
the lunatic fringe who have hijacked the whole Democratic party.”
“Bang
bang Nancy’s silver hammer went down on Adam Smith’s head …” political
commentator Doug Heye wrote, alluding to an old Beatles song.
Smith’s flip-flop wasn’t playing well in his home state, either.
“He
has no courage of his convictions, and had to deny his own words an
hour later,” said Dori Monson, host of a Seattle radio show, according
to MyNorthwest.com.
Later, Smith tried to clarify his remarks during an appearance on Monson’s program.
“All I was saying was, ‘At the end of the day, we can’t force the Senate any more than they can force us,'” Smith told Monson, according to MyNorthwest.com. “‘We have to try to leverage them and persuade them.'” Fox News' Brooke Singman contributed to this story.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo fired back at one of his predecessors in an exclusive interview with Fox News' "The Ingraham Angle" Thursday, saying that John Kerry was indulging in a "fantasy" by claiming that Iran had reined in its destabilizing behavior after signing the 2015 nuclear deal.
"It’s
a fantasy to think that the nuclear deal was good for the United States
of America, protecting the American people," Pompeo told Laura
Ingraham. "There were terror campaigns, there were missile systems that
were enhanced, improved during the [period of the] JCPOA [nuclear deal]
-- the money that the Iranian regime was permitted to have underwrote
the very Shia militias that were the ones that took on and ultimately
killed an American."
Kerry told MSNBC Wednesday night that there
is "no way at all" the world is safer after Trump ordered a drone strike
that killed Quds Force Gen. Qassem Soleimani at Baghdad's airport last
week. The former senator from Massachusetts and 2004 Democratic
presidential nominee also claimed that Trump was "fixated on undoing
anything Barack Obama did ... [and] willing to run the risk of outright
war in the effort to fulfill his fantasy."
"This
isn’t about undoing what Obama did," Pompeo told Ingraham Thursday.
"This is about protecting and defending the American people. President
Trump has been incredibly resolute in that."
During an address to
the nation on Wednesday, hours after Iran fired 16 missiles at two Iraqi
airbases housing American servicemembers in response to Soleimani's
death, Trump claimed: "The missiles fired last night at us and our
allies were paid for with the funds made available by the last
administration." Pompeo doubled down on that claim, emphasizing
that money paid to Iran by the Obama administration "ultimately ends up
in the hands of people who wanted to do Americans harm."
In
September 2016, the Treasury Department acknowledged that $1.7 billion
was transferred from the U.S. to Iran in foreign hard currency. An
initial $400 million delivery was sent to Tehran Jan. 17, the same day
Iran agreed to release four American prisoners. The remaining $1.3
billion was paid in subsequent weeks. The $1.7 billion was the
settlement of a 37-year-old dispute between the U.S. and Iran over a
$400 million payment made by the last Shah of Iran. In addition to those
payments by the U.S., billions of dollars in Iranian assets held in
financial institutions overseas were unfrozen as part of the nuclear
deal.
"All
the things that we are now confronting are a direct result of the
resources that the regime had available as a result of that terrible
nuclear deal," Pompeo said.
Pompeo also responded to criticism of a
classified briefing to lawmakers Wednesday that was meant to explain
the rationale behind the Soleimani strike. Democrats have said they do
not believe the intelligence shown in the briefing proved that Soleimani
represented an immediate threat to U.S. interests, while Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, called the briefing "lame" and "insane," describing it as the worst he had sat through in his time on Capitol Hill.
"I
thought we did a dynamite job," said Pompeo, who took part in the
briefing. "I mean that in the truest sense, but we did our level best to
present them with all the facts that we could in that setting." The
secretary of state also insisted that Soleimani was planning "a series
of imminent attacks" when he was killed.
"We
don’t know precisely when -- and we don’t know precisely where," Pompeo
said. "But it was real ... There was a real opportunity here and there
was a real necessity here. We made the right decision. The president
made the right call."
When Ingraham asked whether the
administration could trust Congress with classified information, Pompeo
said: "Well, we shared an awful lot with them yesterday ... I think
there are a number of people who are using this as a political ax to
grind. I think that’s most unfortunate."
Pompeo
also responded to the apparent downing of a Ukrainian International
Airlines plane by Iran early Wednesday that killed all 176 people on
board. U.S., Canadian and British officials said earlier Thursday it is
"highly likely" that the jet was struck by an Iranian missile.
"I’ve
seen the reporting. I can only say that we need to get to the bottom of
this very, very quickly," said Pompeo, who added that while a
mechanical failure could have caused the crash, "if, in fact, it’s the
case that there was something more insidious to this, the American
people should know that this would have been Iranian malfeasance that
caused it."
BEIJING (AP) — Global stock markets and oil prices rebounded Thursday as anxiety over potential U.S.-Iranian conflict eased.
London and Frankfurt opened higher and Tokyo gained more than 2%. Shanghai and Hong Kong also advanced.
Markets
sank Wednesday after Tehran launched missiles at bases housing
Americans in Iraq in retaliation for the killing of an Iranian general.
Anxiety subsided after reports indicated no Americans were killed and
President Donald Trump said Iran “appears to be standing down.”
The
lack of casualties “gave the markets more confidence that the Iranians
had instigated little more than the intention to make a public show of
force mainly to save face at home,” said Stephen Innes of AxiTrader in a
report.
In
early trading, London’s FTSE 100 gained 0.4% to 7,609.67 and
Frankfurt’s DAX rose 1.5% to 13,520.35. France’s CAC 40 added 0.6% to
6,068.31.
On Wall Street, futures for the benchmark S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average were up nearly 0.4%.
On Wednesday, the S&P 500 rose 0.5% while the Dow advanced 0.6%. The Nasdaq composite rose 0.7% to a record.
In
Asia, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 powered ahead 2.3% to 23,739.87 and Hong
Kong’s Hang Seng rose 1.7% to 28,561.00. The Shanghai Composite Index
added 0.9% to 3,094.88.
Seoul’s Kospi rose 1.6% to 2,186.45 and Sydney’s S&P-ASX 200 added 0.8% to 6,874.20. India’s Sensex rose 1.4% to 41,409.69.
Taiwan and Southeast Asian markets also advanced while New Zealand declined.
Trump said he would add economic sanctions on Iran but the United States is “ready to embrace peace with all who seek it.”
Oil
prices rebounded Thursday after first surging on news of the Iranian
attack and then falling back once tensions appeared to be easing.
Benchmark
U.S. crude gained 43 cents to $60.05 per barrel in electronic trading
on the New York Mercantile Exchange. On Wednesday, the contract fell
$3.09 to settle at $59.61. It traded as high as $65.65 following the
missile attack.
Brent
crude, used to price international oils, advanced 52 cents to $65.96
per barrel in London. It fell $2.83 the previous session to $65.44.
Gold had a similar whipsaw day. It climbed as high as $1,604.20 per ounce before settling at $1,560.10.
Also
Thursday, China reported consumer prices rose 4.5% in December over a
year earlier, propelled by surging pork prices due to an outbreak of
disease.
In currency trading, the dollar gained to 109.34 yen from Wednesday’s 109.08 yen. The euro advanced to $1.1120 from $1.1105.
An Indiana congressman who served in Afghanistan as a member of the Navy Reserve spoke out on behalf of America's military veterans Wednesday after U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., claimed she suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.
U.S.
Rep. Jim Banks, a Republican, said Omar's comments were a "disgrace,"
calling the remarks "offensive to our nation's veterans who really do
have PTSD after putting their life on the line to keep America safe."
Omar
had made her remarks during a news conference with other Democrats on
Wednesday, at which she said she "felt ill" because of "everything that
is taking place" in the Middle East -- a reference to the recent U.S. tensions between the U.S. and Iran,
including last week's U.S. airstrike in Baghdad and Iran's missile
attacks early Wednesday against airbases in Iraq where U.S. service
members are stationed.
"And I think every time I hear about ...
I hear of conversations around war, I find myself being stricken with
PTSD," she said. "And I find peace knowing that I serve with great
advocates for peace and people who have shown courage against war."
After
Banks took issue with her comments, Omar posted a reply on Twitter,
making reference to her youth in war-torn Somalia. After leaving her
homeland with her family near the start of the Somali Civil War in 1991,
she would spend four years at a Kenyan refugee camp before immigrating
to the U.S. in 1995.
"Hi Jim, I survived war as a child and deal
with post-traumatic stress disorder—much like many who have served or
lived through war," she wrote in the tweet, which was addressed to Banks
but not tagged. "It’s shameful that you as a member of Congress would
erase the PTSD of survivors."
But Banks doubled down on his
comments later Wednesday evening, posting a video that showed Omar and
other Democrats giggling in the background as their colleague, U.S. Rep.
Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, spoke to reporters about the more than
4,000 U.S. service members killed in Iraq over the years.
"Your
words and actions at today’s press conference reveal your feelings
toward our soldiers serving abroad and the video speaks for itself,"
Banks wrote, including a video of the news conference shared by Rep.
Jody Hice, R-Ga.
Omar posted another message about a half-hour
later, elaborating that she had "lived in a war zone" and had "seen what
conflict does to families and communities.""If you aren't familiar with Banks, he's been with the Navy since 2012,"
one Twitter user wrote, "and was deployed to Afghanistan about 6 years
ago. So he knows a little something about PTSD."
Democratic presidential hopefuls Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders
faced criticism online Wednesday for participating in a conference call
with an Iranian-American advocacy group just a day after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack in Iraq aimed at U.S. military personnel. The
group was the National Iranian American Council (NIAC), which critics
claim lobbies in Washington on behalf of the Iranian government.
The “#NoWarWithIran Strategy Call,”
hosted by MoveOn.org, another advocacy group and political action
committee first organized in 1998 in response to former President Bill
Clinton’s impeachment, also included commentary from Jamal Abdi,
president of NIAC. U.S. Reps. Barbara Lee and Ro Khanna, both California
Democrats, and others also participated.
Charlie
Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, called Warren and Sanders
“disgraceful” for participating in the call with “pro-Iran group NIAC
the day after Iran bombed our military bases.”
“Whose side are the Democrat frontrunners actually on?” he asked.
“How
is this conference call with Sanders/Warren/ pro-Iran lobby group NIAC,
with ties to Tehran & Iranian govt (who just bombed our military
bases) different than the claims they made against Trump??” another user
asked. “Are they conspiring with the enemy to overthrow our govt??
Start impeachment?”
"Willingness to engage with NIAC - the
Khomeini lobby in DC - should be automatic disqualification for any
candidate," another user wrote.
NIAC has been accused by other
members of the Iranian-American community of working as part of a
U.S.-based pro-Islamic jihad alliance. A former CIA officer alleged in a 2009 brief that NIAC
was actively working to influence Democrats -- in Congress and the
Obama administration -- to push a foreign policy that would benefit
Tehran’s cleric regime. A federal judge ordered NIAC to pay more than
$180,000 in 2013 after its failed defamation lawsuit against
Iranian-American writer Hassan Daioleslam, who published pieces showing
NIAC's links to the regime, the Washington Free Beacon reported.
The
U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said the work of
NIAC’s founder, Trita Parsi, was "not inconsistent with the idea that he
was first and foremost an advocate for the regime." Parsi lobbied
Congress and met with Obama administration officials before the signing
of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. Documents uncovered during the defamation
lawsuit also showed correspondence between NIAC and Iran’s Foreign
Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.
The group, meanwhile, insists it
works independently from the Iranian government. According to its
official website, NIAC is a “nonprofit dedicated to strengthening the
voice of Iranian Americans and promoting greater understanding between
the American and Iranian people.”
On the call, Warren, D-Mass.,
and Sanders, an independent from Vermont, both slammed President Trump
for what was described as his “march to war” with Iran that they claim
first began in May 2018 when he announced the U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal with world powers.
Trump
had signed a presidential memorandum withdrawing the U.S. from the
controversial agreement signed by his predecessor, former President
Barack Obama. He said he will be re-instituting the highest level of
sanctions and warned other countries against helping the Iranian
government. The deal had allowed the Iranian regime to garner up to $150
billion in cash – most of which was used to fund state-run terrorist
operations, the Free Beacon reported.
The conference call came
after Wednesday morning's firing of as many as 15 ballistic missiles at
two bases in Iraq housing U.S. troops in a major retaliation by the
rogue regime after the U.S. airstrike that killed Iranian Quds Force
Gen. Qassem Soleimani at Baghdad International Airport last week.
Iranian
efforts to killed American service members were thwarted by the
military's Early Warning Systems, Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Gen.
Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told
reporters Wednesday. No U.S. casualties were reported.
“There
seems to be a pause in the hostilities for now, and I hope it endures
but let’s be clear – this is a crisis of Donald Trump’s making,” Warren
told those who dialed in Wednesday night. “The first job of the
president of the United States is to keep America safe, but this
president’s reckless actions have made us far less safe.
“He
started this back in 2018 when he tore up the Iran nuclear deal. Iran
had agreed not to advance its nuclear program, and the international
community had already certified that Iran was following the terms of the
deal. Our allies wanted to stay in it but not Donald Trump.
“Instead he decided just to tear it up,” she said.
Warren
also accused Trump of “tweeting threats of war crimes” when he
threatened attacks on Iranian cultural sites, which she said was “not in
America’s favor and it is wrong.” Trump had subsequently said he would
take no action that violated international law.
Speaking later on
in the hour-long call, Sanders accused Trump of telling “the same old
lies” told by the Bush administration in 2002-03 that he said lead to
the deaths of 4,500 “brave American soldiers,” the death of “hundreds of
thousands of Iraqis” and veterans suffering from PTSD still today.
“When
I think back in my lifetime to the disastrous wars, the unnecessary
wars that have taken place. I think back to Vietnam where people I knew
got killed, where my generation suffered so terribly – 59,000 dead, God
knows how many wounded. People still sleeping out on the streets today
from that war,” Sanders also said, recounting his personal history of
America fighting in foreign wars oversees.
“I think the lesson is
that war should be avoided in every way that we can. War is the last
response, not the first response,” he continued. “I will do everything I
can to prevent this war.”
“I’ll be working to make sure that we
pass a War Powers Act that makes it clear that the Constitution says
that it is the Congress – not the president – who determines whether
this country goes to war. And that I’m afraid Congress has forgotten
about that under Republican and Democratic administrations. And we’re
going to do everything we can to pass that resolution.
Sanders
closed out his remarks referencing health care, climate change and
homelessness – issues that he said were more deserving of U.S.
investment than a potential war with Iran.
MoveOn
used the call to promote #NoWarWithIran rallies to be held Thursday
across the U.S. in an effort to show public opposition against war with
Iran. Both Warren and Sanders urged listeners to attend their nearest
event. Move On said more than 7,000 people dialed into the call. More
than 70,000 also listened to the call on Facebook Live.
More Democrats are urging House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to send the articles of impeachment against President Trump to the Senate so a trial can get underway.
Those joining the list include Sen. Dianne Feinstein from Pelosi's home state of California, as well as Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and independent Angus King of Maine, who caucuses with the Democrats.
“The
longer it goes on the less urgent it becomes,” Feinstein told
Politico about Pelosi's withholding of the articles approved last month,
charging Trump with abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. “So if
it’s serious and urgent, send them over. If it isn’t, don’t send it
over.”
Manchin
agreed with Feinstein that the House “should move on” and deliver the
articles to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
"It is time," King said Tuesday, according to NBC News.
Pelosi
has been holding on to the articles since December in an effort to get
McConnell, R-Ky., to agree to certain conditions for a trial, such as
allowing witnesses to testify.
“We need to get folks to testify
and we need more information ... but nonetheless, I’m ready,” Sen. Jon
Tester, D-Mont., said, according to Politico. “I don’t know what leverage we have. It looks like the cake is already baked.”
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., is seen in her Capitol
Hill office in Washington, Feb. 11, 2015. (Associated Press)
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. and Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., also said it was time.
“We are reaching a point where the articles of impeachment should be sent,” Blumenthal told reporters.
Former national security adviser John Bolton
on Monday said he would be willing to testify in a Senate trial if he
was subpoenaed and Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said he wants to hear from
him.
Still, McConnell said Tuesday he has the votes to move forward with a trial without any witnesses.
House
Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff has also left open the
possibility that Bolton could appear before the House if the Senate
doesn't call him.
Pelosi said she plans to hold on to the impeachment articles until she learns about how the Senate trial will proceed. Fox News' Marisa Schultz contributed to this report.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., is seen in her Capitol
Hill office in Washington, Feb. 11, 2015. (Associated Press)
CNN’s Scott Jennings once again took liberals to the cleaners on the Abrego Garcia case, the ‘Maryland man...
