Chicago's Lori Lightfoot tweets against Trump as bullets fly outside funeral home

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot pushed back Tuesday evening against talk of a federal clampdown on big-city lawlessness, saying she wouldn’t allow President Trump to “terrorize” the city’s residents by sending in federal troops.
Ironically, Lightfoot's Twitter message came almost simultaneously as at least 14 people were reportedly shot outside a funeral home on the city's South Side -- with a number of other shootings occuring elsewhere in the city as well.
“Under no circumstances will I allow Donald Trump’s troops to come to Chicago and terrorize our residents,” Lightfoot wrote.
"We do not welcome dictatorship," the mayor added in a newspaper interview.

"We do not welcome dictatorship."
— Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot

Mayor of Chicago Lori Lightfoot speaks in Chicago, May 20, 2019. (Associated Press)

After news spread about the funeral home shootings, Lightfoot vowed those responsible would be held accountable.
"Too many guns are on our streets and in the hands of people who should never possess them," Lightfoot wrote. "These individuals will be held accountable. I ask that anyone with information on this incident please come forward or sumbit a tip anonymously at cpdtip.com."
The victims were fired upon while leaving the funeral home when a fast-moving vehicle rode past around 6:30 p.m. local time, according to police.
Some of the mourners shot back at the vehicle before it crashed down the block. The victims were taken to five hospitals in serious and critical condition. At least one person has been arrested but police haven’t given a motive or said if the shooter and the victims knew each other, the Chicago Tribune reported.
The funeral was for a 31-year-old man fatally shot last week near Tuesday’s shooting, The Chicago Sun-Times reported, citing sources.
On Monday, President Trump vowed to send federal forces into the city.
That same day, Lightfoot told MSNBC she would not allow “tyranny” in Chicago – a reference to controversial tactics used by federal agents sent into Portland, Ore., to quell rioting – but admitted Tuesday the city would be working “collaboratively” with the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to bring down violent crime, the Tribune reported.
“All those agencies are here. They've been here for decades. They have ongoing cases that they're investigating,” Lightfoot said, according to FOX 32 in Chicago.
Cities frequently work with federal agencies on cases involving drugs and violent crime.
A neighbor who lives near the funeral home said she went outside when they heard gunshots.
“All we saw was bodies just laying everywhere. They were shot up everywhere,” Arnita Geder told the Sun-Times. “We thought it was a war out here. It’s ridiculous all the shooting that’s going on out here, it really has to stop.”
Lightfoot said Tuesday the city welcomes actual “partnership” with the federal government.
“But we do not welcome dictatorship, we do not welcome authoritarianism and we do not welcome unconstitutional arrest and detainment of our residents,” she told the Tribune.
She said the city would go to court if the federal government deployed “unnamed federal special secret agents onto our streets to detain people without cause and effectively take away their civil rights and their civil liberties without due process,” referring again to Portland.
Last Thursday, Lightfoot called White House press secretary a “Karen” on Twitter after McEnany said Lightfoot was a “derelict mayor" amid Chicago's escalating violence.
Hey Karen, watch your mouth,” Lightfoot tweeted in reference to McEnany.
“Karen” is a pejorative word usually referring to a middle-aged white woman who seems entitled.
On Friday, Chicago saw more unrest as police and rioters clashed near the city's Christopher Columbus statue in Grant Park. Nearly 20 police officers were injured as rioters hurled objects at them.
Tuesday’s shooting was one of the worst in the city’s recent memory and comes as more than 2,000 people have been shot in Chicago this year, FOX 32 reported.
The latest shooting came a day after more than 20 people were shot in the city Monday and after a deadly weekend in which 63 people were shot and 12 were killed.
Lightfoot was among several big-city mayors demanding the withdrawal of "federal forces" earlier this week in two letters to Attorney General Bill Barr and Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Fox News' Louis Casiano contributed to this report.

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US sanctions Chinese companies over Muslim abuse complaints

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government has imposed trade sanctions on 11 companies it says are implicated in human rights abuses in China’s Muslim northwestern region of Xinjiang.

Monday’s announcement adds to U.S. pressure on Beijing over Xinjiang, where the ruling Communist Party is accused of mass detentions, forced labor and other abuses against Muslim minorities.

Xinjiang is among a series of conflicts including human rights, trade and technology that have caused U.S.-Chinese relations to plunge to their lowest level in decades.

The Trump administration also has imposed sanctions on four Chinese officials over the accusations. Beijing responded by announcing unspecified penalties on four U.S. senators who are critics of its human rights record.

The Department of Commerce said the addition of the 11 companies to its Entity List will limit their access to U.S. goods and technology. It gave no details of what goods might be affected.

“This action will ensure that our goods and technologies are not used in the Chinese Communist Party’s despicable offensive against defenseless Muslim minority populations,” said Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross in a statement.

China has detained an estimated 1 million or more members of the Uighur and other Muslim ethnic minority groups in internment camps.

The government describes them as vocational training facilities aimed at countering Muslim radicalism and separatist tendencies. It says those facilities have since been closed, a claim that is impossible to confirm given the restrictions on visits and reporting about the region.

Veterans of the camps and family members say those held are forced, often with the threat of violence, to denounce their religion, culture and language and swear loyalty to Communist Party leader and head of state Xi Jinping.

The companies cited Monday include clothing manufacturers and technology suppliers.

Two companies cited, Xinjiang Silk Road BGI and Beijing Liuhe BGI, are subsidiaries of BGI Group, one of the world’s biggest gene-sequencing companies. The Commerce Department said they were “conducting genetic analyses used to further the repression” of Muslim minorities.

Human rights groups say security forces in Xinjiang appear to be creating a genetic database with samples from millions of people including through using blood and other samples subjects are compelled to provide. Nationwide, authorities have gathered genetic information from the Chinese public for almost two decades that the government says is for use in law enforcement.

Phone calls Tuesday to BGI’s public relations and investor relations departments weren’t answered.

Three of the companies cited were identified by investigations by The Associated Press in 2018 and 2020 as being implicated in forced labor.

One company, Nanchang O-Film Tech, supplies screens and lenses to Apple, Samsung and other technology companies. AP reporters found employees from Xinjiang at its factory in the southern city of Nanchang weren’t allowed out unaccompanied and were required to attend political classes.

U.S. customs authorities seized a shipment from the second company, Hetian Haolin Hair Accessories, on suspicion it was made by forced labor. People who worked for the third, Hetian Taida, which produces sportswear sold to U.S. universities and sports teams, told AP detainees were compelled to work there.

The Commerce Department imposed similar restrictions last October and in June on a total of 37 companies it said were “engaged in or enabling” abuses in Xinjiang.

The department issued a warning on July 1 that companies that handle goods made by forced labor or that supply technology that might be used in labor camps or for surveillance might face unspecified “reputational, economic and legal risks.”

The Chinese foreign ministry criticized the warning and said Beijing will take “necessary measures” to protect Chinese companies but gave no details.

Federal agents, local streets: A ‘red flag’ in Oregon

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Federal officers’ actions at protests in Oregon’s largest city, hailed by President Donald Trump but done without local consent, are raising the prospect of a constitutional crisis — one that could escalate as weeks of demonstrations find renewed focus in clashes with camouflaged, unidentified agents outside Portland’s U.S. courthouse.

State and local authorities, who didn’t ask for federal help, are awaiting a ruling in a lawsuit filed late last week. State Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in court papers that masked federal officers have arrested people on the street, far from the courthouse, with no probable cause and whisked them away in unmarked cars.

Trump says he plans to send federal agents to other cities, too.

“We’re going to have more federal law enforcement, that I can tell you,” Trump said Monday. “In Portland, they’ve done a fantastic job. They’ve been there three days, and they really have done a fantastic job in a very short period of time.”

Constitutional law experts said federal officers’ actions in the progressive city are a “red flag” in what could become a test case of states’ rights as the Trump administration expands federal policing.

“The idea that there’s a threat to a federal courthouse and the federal authorities are going to swoop in and do whatever they want to do without any cooperation and coordination with state and local authorities is extraordinary outside the context of a civil war,” said Michael Dorf, a professor of constitutional law at Cornell University.

“It is a standard move of authoritarians to use the pretext of quelling violence to bring in force, thereby prompting a violent response and then bootstrapping the initial use of force in the first place,” Dorf said.

The Chicago Tribune, citing anonymous sources, reported Monday that Trump planned to deploy 150 federal agents to Chicago. The ACLU of Oregon has sued in federal court over the agents’ presence in Portland, and the organization’s Chicago branch said it would similarly oppose a federal presence.

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“This is a democracy, not a dictatorship,” Oregon Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, said on Twitter. “We cannot have secret police abducting people in unmarked vehicles. I can’t believe I have to say that to the President of the United States.”

The Department of Homeland Security tweeted that federal agents were barricaded in Portland’s U.S. courthouse at one point and had lasers pointed at their eyes in an attempt to blind them.

“Portland is rife with violent anarchists assaulting federal officers and federal buildings,” the tweet said. “This isn’t a peaceful crowd. These are federal crimes.”

Top leaders in the U.S. House said Sunday that they were “alarmed” by the Trump administration’s tactics in Portland and other cities. They have called on federal inspectors general to investigate.

Trump, who’s called the protesters “anarchists and agitators,” said the DHS and Justice Department agents are on hand to restore order at the courthouse and help Portland.

Nightly protests, which began after George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police, have devolved into violence.

The Trump administration’s actions run counter to the usual philosophies of American conservatives, who typically treat state and local rights with great sanctity and have long been deeply wary of the federal government — particularly its armed agents — interceding in most situations.

But Trump has shown that his actions don’t always reflect traditional conservatism — particularly when politics, and in this case an impending election, are in play.

One prominent Republican, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, who is from the libertarian-leaning flank of the party, criticized federal policing.

“We cannot give up liberty for security. Local law enforcement can and should be handling these situations in our cities but there is no place for federal troops or unidentified federal agents rounding people up at will,” Paul said in a tweet Monday.

The protests have roiled Portland for 52 nights. Many rallies have attracted thousands and been largely peaceful. But smaller groups of up to several hundred people have focused on federal property and local law enforcement buildings, at times setting fires to police precincts, smashing windows and clashing violently with local police.

Portland police used tear gas on multiple occasions until a federal court order banned its officers from doing so without declaring a riot. Now, concern is growing that the tear gas is being used against demonstrators by federal officers instead.

Anger at the federal presence escalated on July 11, when a protester was hospitalized with critical injuries after a U.S. Marshals Service officer struck him in the head with a less-lethal round. Video shows the man, identified as Donavan LaBella, standing across the street from the officers holding a speaker over his head when he was hit.

Court documents filed in cases against protesters show that federal officers have posted lookouts on the upper stories of the courthouse and have plainclothes officers circulating in the crowd. Court papers in a federal case against a man accused of shining a laser in the eyes of Federal Protective Service agents show that Portland police turned him over to U.S. authorities after federal officers identified him.

Mayor Ted Wheeler, who’s has been under fire for his handling of the protests, said on national TV talk shows Sunday that the demonstrations were dwindling before federal officers engaged.

“They are sharply escalating the situation. Their presence here is actually leading to more violence and more vandalism. And it’s not helping the situation at all,” Wheeler said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

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“They’re not wanted here. We haven’t asked them here,” Wheeler said. “In fact, we want them to leave.”

Indeed, crowds of demonstrators had begun to dwindle a week ago, and some in the liberal city — including Black community leaders — had begun to call for the nightly demonstrations to end.

But by the weekend, the presence of federal troops and Trump’s repeated references to Portland as a hotbed of “anarchists” seemed to give a new life to the protests and attract a broader base.

On Sunday night, a crowd estimated at more than 500 people gathered outside the courthouse, including dozens of self-described “moms” who linked arms in front of a chain-link fence outside the courthouse. The demonstration continued into Monday morning.

“It seems clear that there were at least some federal crimes committed here,” said Steve Vladeck, a constitutional law professor at the University of Texas.

Trump pounding at defund the police, but Biden is an elusive target

Things would be so much easier for the Trump campaign if Joe Biden was in favor of defunding the police.

But the president and his team are determined to tie every out-there left-wing position around their opponent’s neck, brushing aside his denials.
This is not a novel political tactic. Both parties try to paint opposing nominees as extreme and warn of the horrible fate that will befall America if they become (or remain) president. Both parties try to caricature the other (Republicans will take away your health care and cater to the wealthy, Democrats will bankrupt the country and allow riots).
But Biden is a fascinating case study. While he’s certainly more liberal than any past Democratic standard-bearer of the modern era, he’s largely avoided embracing the most controversial proposals from the Bernie/AOC wing of the party. Biden has said repeatedly he doesn’t support defunding the police, he didn’t back the Green New Deal and refused to support Medicare for All, drawing flak from the woke progressives.
But President Trump took a very different tack in the Chris Wallace interview that aired Sunday.
“Biden wants to defund the police,” Trump said.
“No he, sir, he does not,” Wallace countered.

“Look,” Trump said. “He signed a charter with Bernie Sanders; I will get that one...Did you read the charter that he agreed to with...”
“It says nothing about defunding the police,” Wallace said.
“Oh really? It says abolish, it says -- let’s go. Get me the charter, please.”
An aide brought the document, and Wallace was right--it did not address taking money away from police departments.
After the “Fox News Sunday” interview aired, Trump tweeted: “He may use different words, but that’s what he wants to do.”
Now “wants to do” is an interesting political standard: Wants to raise your taxes. Wants to take your guns away. But in politics you have to make the case. The president’s charge about the Bernie agreement was wrong, so he tried to say it’s part of Biden’s hidden agenda.
The Trump campaign hits this hard in fundraising pitches, one of which is titled “No More Police,” saying “the Democrats have made it clear that they want to defund and abolish our police.” Another says, “As Joe Biden and his Democrat colleagues continue to push their defund the police agenda, criminals across the country are seizing the opportunity to loot and tear down our monuments to America’s founders.”

True, some Democrats have a defunding agenda, which is why the Trump people keep lumping them in with Biden.
Now Biden did give the opposition an opening in a conversation with liberal activist Ady Barkan, who asked, “But do we agree that we can redirect some of the funding?”
“Yes, absolutely,” Biden replied.
But what Biden said next was not included in a widely circulated video of the interview: “And by the way, not just redirect--condition them. If they don’t eliminate chokeholds, they don’t get Byrne grants. If they don’t do the following, they don’t get any help.”
Still, Biden appeared to open the door, since some say diverting is defunding.
Now the former vice president does have liberal positions that provide a big target for the Trump forces. His recently unveiled $2-trillion climate plan is far more ambitious than what he discussed in the primaries and reflects a desire to win over Sanders supporters. Biden has said he’ll raise capital gains taxes but not middle-class taxes, but hasn’t made clear how he’ll pay for all his programs--a good subject for journalistic inquiry, if the press was more focused on the Biden campaign.

Trump wants to run against Biden as a socialist who would cripple the police and leave cities defenseless. So far, since Biden has been around so long that most voters don’t view him as a scary figure, it hasn’t worked. But in the midst of a pandemic, both sides can expect a long, hard-fought and sometimes ugly fall campaign.

Missouri AG calls felony charges against armed Missouri homeowners 'a political prosecution'

St. Louis' top prosecutor faced intense criticism on Monday-- including from the state's governor and attorney general-- after bringing felony charges against the homeowners seen in cellphone video brandishing guns when protesters appeared outside their home in a gated community. 
Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt told "Fox News @ Night"  Monday that he is seeking to have the charges against the homeowners dismissed, calling it "a political prosecution."
St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner, the city’s top prosecutor, said Mark and Patricia McCloskey -- both personal injury attorneys in their 60s -- will be charged with felony unlawful use of a weapon following the June 28 incident.
"It is illegal to wave weapons in a threatening manner -- that is unlawful in the city of St. Louis," Gardner said in a statement.
Missouri Gov. Mike Parson, a Republican, said last week he would consider pardoning the couple should they be criminally charged.
"Kim Gardner’s action toward the McCloskeys is outrageous," he wrote on Twitter Monday. "Even worse, the Circuit Attorney’s office has admitted there is a backlog of cases and dozens of homicides that haven’t been prosecuted, yet she has accelerated this case forward."
Schmitt argued that the right to self-defense is "deeply rooted" in the constitution and said the state has an expansive "castle doctrine," which "gives broad authority to individuals to protect their lives, the lives of their family members, their homes, and their property."
"At a time when there's calls to defund the police, at a time with skyrocketing violent crime rates -- including here in Missouri and in St. Louis -- we've got a prosecutor now targeting individuals for exercising their fundamental rights under the second amendment," Schmitt said.
The McCloskeys have said they were defending themselves, with tensions high in St. Louis amid nationwide police protests sparked by the police custody death of George Floyd. The McCloskeys said that the crowd of demonstrators broke an iron gate marked with "No Trespassing" and "Private Street" signs and that some violently threatened them.

Armed homeowners standing in front of their house along Portland Place confront protesters as they march to Mayor Lyda Krewson's house on Sunday, June 28, 2020, in the Central West End in St. Louis. (Laurie Skrivan/St. Louis Post-Dispatch/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

The husband and wife maintained they were protecting their home. St. Louis police seized the rifle from the home pursuant to a search warrant. No shots were fired but the incident quickly went viral and fueled the debate over rights property owners have when confronted with perceived threats.
Schmitt on Monday noted how the incident was on a private street and said you have a right to "defend your castle" under Missouri law.
"This is a politically motivated prosecution by a prosecutor whose not interesting in prosecuting violent crimes," he added.
Schmitt added that he is seeking to have the case dismissed "not just for the McCloskeys, but for every Missourian whose rights are threatened by a rogue prosecutor who seeks to punish people for exercising their fundamental right to self-defense."
Fox News' Bradford Betz and Louis Casiano contributed to this report

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131 apply to fill vacancy after Rep. John Lewis’ death

At least 131 people applied to be tapped by party officials to be nominated to defend Georgia’s Fifth Congressional District after the Friday death of Rep. John Lewis, a spokesperson for the Democratic Party of Georgia told Fox News on Sunday.
Lewis, 80, a former leading civil rights activist, died Friday night after serving 33 years in the House. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer late last year.
Georgia law requires the replacement nomination to be chosen relatively quickly and that person will face Angela Stanton-King, a Republican, on Nov.3.
A committee will convene on Monday and a replacement may be named later in the day. The committee includes  Atlanta  Mayor  Keisha  Lance Bottoms and Stacey Abrams, the former Democratic leader of the Georgia House, to name a few.
Theron Johnson, the CEO of Paramount Consulting, told 11 Alive that the state should vote for the candidate to replace Lewis.
"There were few things more sacred to him than the power of the people to make their voices heard at the ballot box," he wrote in a statement, according to the station. "Out of respect to Congressman Lewis’s legacy, his successor should be chosen and elected by the democratic voters of the 5th Congressional District of Georgia, not party officials.”
Fox News' Kelly Phares contributed to this report

If Democrats win Texas it’s all over, Sen. Ted Cruz says

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said in a video posted on Sunday that if the Democrats take Texas and its 38 Electoral College votes it would be “all over” for the Republican Party in national politics.

“Texas is the single biggest target for the left in 2020, politically speaking,” Cruz said in the video, which was tweeted out by the Hill. He continued, “Texas is the key for national domination for years to come. If Democrats win Texas, it’s all over.”
RealClearPolitics shows President Trump leading Joe Biden, his likely Democrat opponent, by an average of .2 percent. The Washington Examiner pointed out that the last time the Lone Star State went for a Democrat was back in 1976 with Jimmy Carter.
Last week, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., told "Hannity" that it is crucial for Republicans to win big in the fall because otherwise, as he put it, "I don't know if we'll ever have an opportunity to win it again."
"They will change the rules of the game," McCarthy told host Sean Hannity. "How we vote, they will change — you know, in California they allow people who are not even citizens to vote in school board races. You know, in California, they lowered the voting age to 17. Do you know, in California, that you could turn your ballot in 17 days after the election? "Those are things they're doing right now," he added.
Fox News' Charles Creitz contributed to this report

Herschel Walker, Mark Cuban square off over BLM on the field

Former NFL running back Herschel Walker squared off with Dallas Mavericks owner and billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban Sunday night in a heated exchange during a Fox News special which explored the state of race relations in the United States and the civil unrest since the death of George Floyd.
In an interview with Fox News host Harris Faulkner during 'The Fight for America' special that aired Sunday night, Walker was asked about the impact of the racial tension overtaking parts of the country and its impact on major U.S. sports leagues.
"Well, you know, one of the problems that I think we have is a lot of these sensitive topics we do not want to address but we do not want to address these sensitive topics so what we try to do is water them down and shout people down," he said.
Walker, a known supporter of Trump, challenged the NFL and the NBA's decision to incorporate the phrase “Black Lives Matters” on their fields and sports jerseys, arguing "some people may not believe in BLM."
"I'm not sure what they stand for," he said, "so how could the NFL say we will support BLM or we will do this here without having the players to say what they want because you cannot put that on a player who may disagree with you," he explained.
Cuban said he largely agreed with Walker but insisted that the NBA's plan to paint the phrase “Black Lives Matters” on several basketball courts was a direct request of the players.
"This is important to our players and importance to the fans, but most importantly it's important to the United States of America that we address these sensitive issues and try to help end systemic racism," he said.

"Wait, wait, no, no," Walker interjected.  "I think Mark is totally correct. We have to address it but you don't address it by saying we will do it without knowing what it is you are doing. No one is coming up with solutions like we will put BLM well…," he trailed off.
"Not to question you, Mark, but do you know what the organization stands for? Besides saying, Black Lives Matter. Because I say one of the things that we have to address is America's lives matter."
Cuban was quick to fire back: "Herschel, they're not mutually exclusive. Every life matters but when someone is in trouble you address them first. The black community has had issues and I think, you know, systemic racism has been here for generations and it's not going away unless we do something about it."