State Dept. accused of stiff-arming intel watchdog over Hillary emails

Top U.S. intelligence officials are running out of patience with the State Department's reluctance to turn over emails from Hillary Clinton's private email server, which have already been shown to have included top secret communications, Fox News has learned.
The Intelligence Community's Inspector General has requested some 30,000 emails from Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State in order to conduct its own review. Those emails are in possession of the State Department, which has been gradually releasing them to the public.
Clinton has agreed to turn over a similar-sized batch of emails, as well as the highly unusual private server she had installed in her Chappaqua, N.Y., home, to the Department of Justice which is conducting a separate investigation.
An intelligence source told Fox News the State Department has pushed back on the government intelligence watchdog's request, and that Director of National Intelligence James Clapper is considering intervening. The source said the inspector general wants to check the controls on the redaction process and ensure that the office can get a handle on all of the potentially sensitive information that was contained in the Clinton emails.
The flurry of activity came after Charles McCullough, the inspector general, notified senior members of Congress that two of four retroactively classified emails found on Clinton's server were deemed "Top Secret, Sensitive Compartmented Information" — a rating that is the government's highest classifications.
Clinton, the former first lady, senator from New York and top diplomat now running for the Democratic presidential nomination, announced Tuesday that she had told aides to turn over the actual server to the Justice Department, giving in to months of demands that she relinquish the device she used to store her correspondence while secretary of state.

More on this...

• Will Clinton server shed light on Benghazi?

• Report: Clinton e-mails contained 'top secret' material

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said McCullough had reported the new details about the higher classification to Congress on Tuesday.
The State Department disputes McCullough's determination that the emails were classified at the time they were sent. McCullough had previously told Congress that potentially hundreds of classified emails are among the cache that Clinton provided to the State Department.
A State Department spokesman said Wednesday that the agency is still processing the emails Clinton initially turned over and took a veiled swipe at Grassley for disclosing what McCullough had said.
"The emails that have been discussed have not been released to public," said Deputy Press Secretary Mark Toner. "We are working to resolve if it is indeed classified [and] we are taking steps to make sure the information is protected and stored properly.
"These emails were not marked classified when they were sent," he added.
A source familiar with the investigation told Fox News late Tuesday that the two emails in question contained operational and geospatial intelligence from the CIA and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), which produces satellite images.
The FBI is investigating whether classified information was improperly sent via and stored on the so-called "home-brew" e-mail server she ran from her home in the New York City suburb after concerns were raised by McCullough. Investigators have said that the probe is not criminal in nature and have denied that Clinton is a target of their inquiries.
Clinton campaign spokesman Nick Merrill said she has "pledged to cooperate with the government's security inquiry, and if there are more questions, we will continue to address them."
It's not clear if the device will yield any information — Clinton's attorney said in March that no emails from the main personal address she used while secretary of state still "reside on the server or on back-up systems associated with the server."
An intelligence source familiar with the matter told Fox News that the campaign's statement of cooperation was overblown, as the FBI had previously taken possession of a thumb drive containing sensitive emails that had been held by Clinton's personal attorney, David Kendall. The Associated Press reported that Kendall gave three thumb drives containing copies of roughly 30,000 work-related emails sent to and from Clinton's personal email address to the FBI after the agency determined he could not remain in possession of the classified information contained in some of the emails.
The AP's report cited a U.S. official briefed on the matter who was not authorized to speak publicly. The State Department previously had said it was comfortable with Kendall keeping the emails at his Washington law office.
Clinton had to this point refused demands from Republican critics to turn over the server to a third party, with Kendall telling the House committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, that "there is no basis to support the proposed third-party review of the server." Clinton has also defended her use of the server, saying she used it as a matter of convenience to limit the number of electronic devices she had to carry.
Congressional Republicans seized on Clinton's reversal late Tuesday.
"It's about time," House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio said in a statement. "Secretary Clinton's previous statements that she possessed no classified information were patently untrue. Her mishandling of classified information must be fully investigated."
"Secretary Clinton said she created this unusual email arrangement with herself for 'convenience.' It may have been convenient for her, but it has been troubling at multiple levels for the rest of the country," said Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., the chairman of the Benghazi select committee. "Secretary Clinton's decision to prioritize her own convenience - and desire for control - over the security of our country's intelligence should concern all people of good conscience."
There is no evidence Clinton used encryption to shield the emails or her personal server from foreign intelligence services or other potentially prying eyes. Kendall has said that Clinton is "actively cooperating" with the FBI inquiry.
In March, Clinton said she exchanged about 60,000 emails in her four years in the Obama administration, about half of which were personal and were discarded. She turned over the other half to the State Department in last December.
The department is reviewing those emails and has begun the process of releasing them to the public.
"As she has said, it is her hope that State and the other agencies involved in the review process will sort out as quickly as possible which emails are appropriate to release to the public, and that the release will be as timely and transparent as possible," Merrill said Tuesday.
Earlier this week, Clinton said in a sworn statement submitted to a federal judge that she has turned over to the State Department all emails from the server "that were or potentially were federal records." The statement, which carries her signature and was signed under penalty of perjury, echoed months of Clinton's past public statements about the matter.

2016 White House hopefuls ready to pitch their plans at the Iowa State Fair

WASHINGTON –  It doesn’t get much more American than the Iowa State Fair – a place where butter is king, hog calling is sport and politicians are tested.
The fair, home to culinary gems like corn in a cup and fierce face-offs in the beard-growing competition kicks off Thursday in Des Moines and has become a perennial stop for presidential candidates looking to test drive their message and electability.
This year, 19 presidential hopefuls from both parties are gearing up to make the annual August pilgrimage, where they’ll be up-close and personal with voters like Bob Hemesath.
“It’s a very relaxed. It’s very open,” Hemesath told FoxNews.com. “It’s not a campaign stump speech. You have the opportunity to shake their hand. It’s a much more open, friendly atmosphere.”
Hemesath, a farmer from northwest Iowa, says he wants candidates to lay out their priorities and goals for the future of Iowa agriculture.
He also wants answers on where they stand on the renewable fuel standard. In May, the Environmental Protection Agency announced changes to how much corn-based ethanol and other biofuels can be mixed into gas and diesel. The new rules could change how Hemesath, like many others in the largely agricultural state, make a living.
The Iowa State Fair, first held in 1854, has turned into a venue where voters go for answers.
The event has grown both in popularity and political prominence. In 2002, attendance hit one million and since then, has passed the million mark 11 times.
This year, how Republican candidates come off could hold even more importance than in past years, Dianne Bystrom, director of the Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women and Politics, told FoxNews.com. In June, the Iowa Republican Party decided to officially scrap its high-profile presidential straw poll which had traditionally served as a test of a candidate’s popularity.
How a politician performs in Iowa, the crucial first-in-the-nation caucus state, can light a path to the White House or dash D.C. dreams.
This year, the challenge for the 17 Republicans in the running for the 2016 GOP nomination will be to find ways to set themselves apart from the pack. Bystrom says they’ll have to do it by striking just the right cord.
“What happened to the kinder, gentler Mike Huckabee?” she asked, referring to his performance, which some called caustic, at the first Republican presidential primary debate on Aug. 6.
Bystrom says candidates who play it positive and cut the controversy out of their 30-minute speeches will make the most impact with voters.
“It’s not a great venue for attacks,” she said. “It’s a family-friendly environment. Set an optimistic tone.”
The PG-rated tone also means candidates should think carefully before making any big policy statements or weighing in on controversial topics like Planned Parenthood and immigration, Bystrom added.
“Talk about your accomplishments,” she said. “What have they done and what will they do for Iowa?”
Among the GOP hopefuls vying for viewer attention are Ohio Gov. John Kasich, Wisconsin Gov.Scott Walker, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, former Sen. Rick Santorum, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, neurosurgeon Ben Carson, former HP CEO Carly Fiorina and Donald Trump.
A handful of Democrats, including Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, former Virginia Sen. Jim Webb, former Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee and Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz will also attend.
Hillary Clinton, former secretary of state, is not scheduled to appear.

GOP Cartoon

The Christian purge has begun: Chaplains banned from preaching that homosexuality is a sin

It wasn’t so much a choice as it was a demand.
Chaplain David Wells was told he could either sign a state-mandated document promising to never tell inmates that homosexuality is “sinful” or else the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice would revoke his credentials.
“We could not sign that paper,” Chaplain Wells told me in a telephone call from his home in Kentucky. “It broke my heart.”
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The Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice revoked his volunteer credentials as an ordained minister – ending 13 years of ministry to underage inmates at the Warren County Regional Juvenile Detention Center.

Chaplain David Wells was told he could either sign a state-mandated document promising to never tell inmates that homosexuality is “sinful” or else the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice would revoke his credentials.

“We sincerely appreciate your years of service and dedication to the youth served by this facility,” wrote Superintendent Gene Wade in a letter to Wells. “However, due to your decision, based on your religious convictions, that you cannot comply with the requirements outlined in DJJ Policy 912, Section IV, Paragraph H, regarding the treatment of LGBTQI youth, I must terminate your involvement as a religious volunteer.”
Wells said that every volunteer in their church received the letter – as did a Baptist church in a nearby community.
The Kentucky regulation clearly states that volunteers working with juveniles “shall not refer to juveniles by using derogatory language in a manner that conveys bias towards or hatred of the LGBTQI community. DJJ staff, volunteers, interns and contractors shall not imply or tell LGBTQI juveniles that they are abnormal, deviant, sinful or that they can or should change their sexual orientation or gender identity.”
For years, Wells and his team have conducted volunteer worship services and counseling to troubled young people – many of whom have been abused.
“I sat across the table from a 16-year-old boy who was weeping and broken over the life he was in,” Wells said. “He had been abused as a child and turned to alcohol and drugs to cope. He wanted to know if there was any hope for him.”
Wells said he had been abused as a young child – so he knew he could answer this young man’s question.
“I was able to look at him and tell him the saving power of Jesus Christ that delivered me – could deliver him,” he said.
But under the state’s 2014 anti-discrimination policy, Wells would not be allowed to have such a discussion should it delve into LGBT issues.

“They told us we could not preach that homosexuality is a sin – period,” Wells told me. “We would not have even been able to read Bible verses that dealt with LGBT issues.”
For the record, Wells said they’ve never used hateful or derogatory comments when dealing with the young inmates.
“They are defining hateful or derogatory as meaning what the Bible says about homosexuality,” he told me.
Mat Staver, the founder of Liberty Counsel, is representing Wells. He said the state’s ban on Biblical counseling is unconstitutional religious discrimination.
“There is no question there is a purging underway,” Staver told me. “The dissenters in the recent Supreme Court decision on gay marriage warned us this would happen.”
Staver is demanding the state immediately reinstate Wells as well as the other volunteer ministers.
“By restricting speech which volunteers are allowed to use while ministering to youth detainees, the State of Kentucky and the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice have violated the protections given to private speech through the First Amendment and the Kentucky Constitution,” Staver wrote in his letter to state officials.
He said the policy “requires affirmation of homosexuality as a precondition for ministers providing spiritual guidance to troubled youth, and singles out a particular theological viewpoint as expressly disfavored by the State of Kentucky.”
In other words – Kentucky has a religious litmus test when it comes to homosexuality – and according to the Lexington Herald-Leader – they aren’t going to back down.
The DJJ told the newspaper that the regulation “is neutral as to religion and requires respectful language toward youth by all staff, contractors and volunteers.”
State Sen. Gerald Neal, a Democrat, dared Christians to challenge the law in court.
“I’m just disappointed that the agendas by some are so narrow that they disregard the rights of others,” he told the newspaper. “Let them sue and let the courts settle it.”
Among those backing Wells is the American Pastors Network.
“Pastors and all Americans must wake up to the reality of expanding efforts to cleanse our nation of all moral truth,” APN President Sam Rohrer said in a statement. “When pastors and all Christians…are forced by government agents to renounce sharing the very reality of sin, they are in fact being prohibited from sharing the healing and life-changing potential of redemption.”
Folks, I warned you this would happen. The Christian purge has begun – and it’s only a matter of time before all of us will be forced to make the same decision Chaplain Wells had to make.
Will you follow God or the government?
Todd Starnes is host of Fox News & Commentary, heard on hundreds of radio stations. His latest book is "God Less America: Real Stories From the Front Lines of the Attack on Traditional Values." Follow Todd on Twitter@ToddStarnes and find him on Facebook.

Oath Keepers arrival at Ferguson protest ‘inflammatory,’ top cop says

Someone has to step up and do it.

Four white men armed with rifles who arrived early Tuesday at protests in Ferguson, Mo., said they were there to protect journalists, but they were not welcomed by police, who fear their presence could prove "inflammatory" amid demonstrations marking the one-year anniversary of the racially charged police shooting of a black man.
Members of the group "Oath Keepers," an association of current and former soldiers or law enforcement and self-professed guardians of the Constitution, told Reuters they were there to provide protection for journalists from the conservative website Infowars.com. But like the police, the mostly African-American protesters seemed to find their presence provocative.
"I hope some black "oath keepers" show up tonight," read one tweet. Another user tweeted, "If oath keepers were black, they would have been killed by the trigger happy white cops."
Meanwhile, authorities arrested nearly two dozen people during a protest that stretched into early Tuesday, marking the anniversary of the Aug. 9, 2014, fatal shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown, although there was no repeat of the violence that scarred weekend demonstrations. Police and community leaders are desperately hoping to avoid a replay of the rioting that occurred after Brown was shot and again in November, after a grand jury declined to indict Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson.

"Their presence was both unnecessary and inflammatory"
- Jon Belmar, the St. Louis County police chief

On Tuesday, there were no shots fired and no burglaries, looting or property damage during the protest along West Florissant Avenue, St. Louis County police spokesman Shawn McGuire said. That thoroughfare was the focus of months of massive protests and sometimes violent unrest last summer after the killing of Brown by a Ferguson police officer. McGuire said approximately 23 arrests were made, though police were still confirming official totals.

More on this...

• Ferguson uprising to continue until 'real change' comes?

Despite the calm, authorities fear any any interference from outside, whether from out-of-town protesters, or groups coming in and claiming to be keeping the peace, could set off new conflict. That prompted some authorities to level criticism at the gun-toting Oath Keepers.
"Their presence was both unnecessary and inflammatory," Jon Belmar, the St. Louis County police chief said, according to Reuters.
It was not the first time Oath Keepers went to Ferguson. In December, members were seen on rooftops and in the streets during protests. The Washington Post reported that members spoke of lending a sense of security to a small community in the national spotlight. Although in both instances, police have threatened arrest, no Oath Keepers were accused of breaking the law.
Founded by Yale Law graduate Stewart Rhodes, the group claims 35,000 members. In a 2008 manifesto, Rhodes warned that Americans will be left to protect themselves and their rights if a "police state comes to America."
"That is a harsh reality, but you had better come to terms with it now, and resolves to not let it happen on your watch," he wrote.

Clinton turns over private server to Justice Dept amid report it contained 'top secret' emails

WASHINGTON –  Hillary Clinton relented Tuesday to months of demands she relinquish the personal email server she used while secretary of state, directing the device be given to the Justice Department.
The decision advances the investigation into the Democratic presidential front-runner's use of a private email account as the nation's top diplomat, and whether classified information was improperly sent via and stored on the home-brew email server she ran from her house in suburban New York City.
Clinton campaign spokesman Nick Merrill said she has "pledged to cooperate with the government's security inquiry, and if there are more questions, we will continue to address them."
It's not clear if the device will yield any information — Clinton's attorney said in March that no emails from the main personal address she used while secretary of state still "reside on the server or on back-up systems associated with the server."
Clinton had to this point refused demands from Republican critics to turn over the server to a third party, with attorney David Kendall telling the House committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, that "there is no basis to support the proposed third-party review of the server."
Republicans jumped on Tuesday's decision to change course, as well as the additional disclosure that two emails that traversed Clinton's personal system were subsequently given one of the government's highest classification ratings.

More on this...

• Report: Clinton e-mails contained 'top secret' material

"All this means is that Hillary Clinton, in the face of FBI scrutiny, has decided she has run out of options," Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus in a statement. "She knows she did something wrong and has run out of ways to cover it up."
Federal investigators have begun looking into the security of Clintons' email setup amid concerns from the inspector general for the intelligence community that classified information may have passed through the system.
There is no evidence she used encryption to shield the emails or her personal server from foreign intelligence services or other potentially prying eyes. Kendall has said previously that Clinton is "actively cooperating" with the FBI inquiry.
In March, Clinton said she exchanged about 60,000 emails in her four years in the Obama administration, about half of which were personal and were discarded. She turned over the other half to the State Department in last December.
The department is reviewing those emails and has begun the process of releasing them to the public.
"As she has said, it is her hope that State and the other agencies involved in the review process will sort out as quickly as possible which emails are appropriate to release to the public, and that the release will be as timely and transparent as possible," Merrill said Tuesday.
Also Tuesday, Kendall gave to the Justice Department three thumb drives containing copies of work-related emails sent to and from her personal email addresses via her private server.
Kendall gave the thumb drives, containing copies of roughly 30,000 emails, to the FBI after the agency determined he could not remain in possession of the classified information contained in some of the emails, according to a U.S. official briefed on the matter who was not authorized to speak publicly.
The State Department previously had said it was comfortable with Kendall keeping the emails at his Washington law office.
Word that Clinton had relented on giving up possession of the server came as Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa said two emails that traversed Clinton's personal system were deemed "Top Secret, Sensitive Compartmented Information" — a rating that is among the government's highest classifications. Grassley said the inspector general of the nation's intelligence community had reported the new details about the higher classification to Congress on Tuesday.
"Secretary Clinton's previous statements that she possessed no classified information were patently untrue," House Speaker John Boehner said in a statement. "Her mishandling of classified information must be fully investigated."
Those two emails were among four that had previously been determined by the inspector general of the intelligence community to have been classified at the time they were sent. The State Department disputes that the emails were classified at that time.
"Department employees circulated these emails on unclassified systems in 2009 and 2011 and ultimately some were forwarded to Secretary Clinton," said State Department spokesman John Kirby. "They were not marked as classified."
The inspector general for the intelligence community had told Congress that potentially hundreds of classified emails are among the cache that Clinton provided to the State Department.
Earlier this week, Clinton said in a sworn statement submitted to a federal judge that she has turned over to the State Department all emails from the server "that were or potentially were federal records." The statement, which carries her signature and was signed under penalty of perjury, echoed months of Clinton's past public statements about the matter.
Clinton has defended her use of the server, saying she used it as a matter of convenience to limit the number of electronic devices she had to carry.

Kerry doubles down on Iran deal, says Tehran has not pursued nuke since 2003

Secretary of State John Kerry doubled down on the controversial Iran nuclear deal Tuesday, telling lawmakers that there was not a better deal available to negotiators and that since 2003 Iran has not pursued a nuclear bomb to the best of America’s knowledge.
Speaking in a moderated discussion on the nuclear deal reached with Iran hosted by Thomson Reuters in New York, Kerry tried to counter Republican claims that a better deal can be reached.
Kerry told the forum that President George W. Bush tried in 2003 and 2008 to get a better deal, but there “is not a better deal to be gotten.”
He went on to say that the argument for a better deal would entail the U.S. maintaining or increasing pressure on Iran by threatening foreign governments and businesses with penalties for doing business with Iran, an idea that Kerry slammed as far-fetched.
"Are you kidding?" he said.
Kerry asserted that European countries wouldn't cooperate with U.S. sanctions, and would walk away from separate U.S.-led penalties against Russia if Congress kills the deal.
He also claimed that the dollar would lose its status as the world's reserve currency, and allies wouldn't support U.S. military action against Iran.
Kerry told participants that there was clearly a period in which Iran was pursuing a nuclear weapon.
“We found them red-handed with facilities they should not have had, with materials they should not have had,” Kerry said.
However, he said that since 2003, Iran has not pursued a weapon to the best knowledge of the U.S. and others.
"They have not pursued a weapon to our best judgment and to the judgment of all our allies, they haven't pursue a weapon, per se, since that period of time," Kerry said.
In terms of the argument for a better deal, Kerry noted that while Iranian leaders issued a fatwah in 2003 that a nuclear weapon should not be pursued, Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) still wants one and has fought against the deal.
“They are opposed to the agreement if that doesn't tell you something,” Kerry said.

Hands Up Cartoon

China Moves to Devalue Yuan, U.S. Dollar Bounces

Currencies in Asia tumbled and stocks in China fluctuated after China's central bank devalued its tightly controlled currency.
The central bank's move sent the yuan down 1.6% against the U.S. dollar early Tuesday. The U.S. dollar rose to as high as 6.3299 Chinese yuan from its close 6.2136 late Monday.
The move comes after disappointing Chinese trade data over the weekend cast doubt on the economic health of the world's no. two economy. It also follows the International Monetary Fund's recent announcement to delay its decision on whether to include the yuan in its basket of reserve currencies.
The yuan's fixing against the U.S. dollar was lowered 1.9% Tuesday from the previous day, its biggest-ever move in a single day. The yuan is allowed to trade 2% above or below the People's Bank of China's daily reference rate against the U.S. dollar.
China shares wavered between negative and positive, a day after the market posted its largest daily percentage gain in a month. The Shanghai Composite Index was last down 0.1% while the smaller Shenzhen market was up 0.3%.
A weaker yuan could threaten other economies in the region that compete with Chinese exports, and the move sent other currencies in Asia lower. A weaker yuan could encourage other central banks in the region to devalue their currencies to stay competitive.
The U.S. dollar rocketed to as high as 1170.80 South Korean won, from 1158.20 late yesterday in Asia. The Korean won was last down 0.8% to trade at 1167.50 to the U.S. dollar.
The Thai baht fell 0.4% to trade at 35.20 to the U.S. dollar while the Singapore dollar fell 0.5% against the U.S. dollar.
The New Zealand dollar and Australian each fell by more than 0.5% each against the U.S. dollar.
Stock markets elsewhere in the region were mixed, following hopes of Chinese stimulus after weak data but a rise in U.S. stocks overnight.
The Nikkei Stock Average was up 0.6%, the S&P ASX 200 is down 0.7% and South Korea's Kospi was up 0.8%.
The recovery on Wall Street as well as expectations for further policy from China to support the economy may help Japan shares, said Hiroichi Nishi, general manager of equity division at SMBC Nikko Securities.
Weak economic data lifted expectations that Beijing would boost spending and continue to prop up the market by buying shares. Talk about a possible merger between China's state-shipping giants revived hopes for reform of state-owned enterprises.
Data Tuesday showed the new yuan loans in China hit a six-year high of 1.48 trillion yuan ($238.3 billion) in July, up from 1.27 trillion yuan in June.
A stronger Japanese yen, often a negative for Japanese exporters, capped the Nikkei's gains. The U.S. dollar traded at Yen124.12, compared with Yen124.61 at late Monday in Asia.
While Brent oil was down 0.5% to $50.14 in Asia trade, prices were up from multi-month lows after on a forecast drop in U.S. shale-oil production and rumors of an emergency meeting of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.

Christian institutions garnering support in ObamaCare challenge

Three Christian universities gained allies Monday in their battle against ObamaCare. Among their supporters: 16 state governments.
Those states, along with a handful of other religious rights organizations, filed friend-of-the-court briefs to the Supreme Court supporting Houston Baptist University, East Texas Baptist University, and Westminster Theological Seminary.
Those schools have appealed the Supreme Court to overturn a circuit court ruling that forces them to expand contraception options in their health insurance plans. The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, the schools’ legal counsel, says the briefs are a major breakthrough.
“This strong show of support for HBU and ETBU (and Westminster Theological Seminary) demonstrates just how important it is that the Supreme Court address the impact of the HHS mandate, particularly on religious groups,” said Diana Verm, Legal Counsel at the Becket Fund, in a statement. “It is especially significant that the 16 state governments are supporting HBU and ETBU at the Supreme Court.”
The case directly challenges the 5^th Circuit Court. That ruling said that the schools were forced to offer all 14 types of contraception spelled out in the HHS mandate of ObamaCare within their health insurance plans. The schools only offered 10 types. They say that the mandate violates their religious freedom. According to the statement, all three schools would have to pay millions in IRS fines if they aren’t allowed exemption.
The Becket Fund identified the 16 states to FoxNews.com as: Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia.
Other organizations that pledged support include the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, the Christian and Missionary Alliance Foundation, and all 181 members of the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities.
“Today’s strong support is an indication that the Court is likely to decide in the upcoming term whether religious ministries, like religious for-profits, will receive protection from the Mandate,” the statement said.
Verm told FoxNews.com that many businesses have been exempted from the mandate, and that all religious institutions should be afforded the same opportunity.
"The Supreme Court has already issued five preliminary orders in favor of religious organizations facing this choice, and we expect it to protect HBU and ETBU as well," she said.

Fox News host Megyn Kelly addresses Trump 'dustup'

Fox News Channel’s Megyn Kelly refused to apologize Monday to GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump after he accused her of asking an unfair question during last week’s Republican presidential debate.
“Apparently Mr. Trump thought the question was unfair and I was attacking him,” “The Kelly File” host told viewers Monday. “I felt he was asked a tough but fair question. We agree to disagree.”
While Trump leads recent polls, the former reality television star has drawn heated criticism from many in his own party for saying Kelly had "blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever" during a TV appearance Friday night.
Kelly, who called Trump an “interesting man that has captured the attention of the electorate,” decided not to respond to personal attacks he’d lodged against her, saying “I certainly will not apologize for doing good journalism.”
“Mr. Trump, I expect, will continue with what has been a successful campaign so far,” said Kelly. “This is a tough business and I think it’s time now to move forward.”
Fox News Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes reached out to Trump directly Monday, assuring him he'll be "treated fairly" by the station, Trump tweeted Monday.
"Roger Ailes just called. He is a great guy & assures me that 'Trump' will be treated fairly on @FoxNews. His word is always good!" wrote Trump, whose unorthodox campaign is dominating the race and summertime polls.
In a statement Monday evening, Ailes described the conversation as "blunt but cordial" and said the air had been cleared.
"Donald Trump and I spoke today. We discussed our concerns, and I again expressed my confidence in Megyn Kelly," Ailes said, describing Kelly as "a brilliant journalist" whom he supports "100 percent."
Ailes added that he assured Trump "that we will continue to cover this campaign with fairness & balance."
Trump is scheduled to return to the network Tuesday, with appearances on two of the network's shows, "Fox & Friends" and "Hannity," a Fox News spokeswoman said.

At least 23 arrested on fourth night of demonstrations in Ferguson

Get them off government support and put them to work. 

At least 23 people were arrested in Ferguson, Mo. Monday night as protesters confronted police on a fourth consecutive night of demonstrations to mark the one-year anniversary of the death of 18-year-old Michael Brown.
St. Louis County Police spokesman Officer Shawn McGuire said early Tuesday that police were still confirming official totals.
Despite the arrests, there were no reports of injuries or violence. McGuire also said that there were no shots fired and no burglaries, looting or property damage during the protest.
Sunday night's demonstration was thrown into chaos after by gunfire and a police shooting that left an 18-year-old critically injured. Earlier Monday, St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger declared a state of emergency, which authorized county Police Chief Jon Belmar to take control of police emergency management in and around Ferguson.
By early Monday evening, hundreds of people had gathered. They marched up and down West Florissant Avenue, the thoroughfare that was the site of protests and rioting after Brown was fatally shot last year in a confrontation with a Ferguson police officer.
The protesters chanted, beat drums and carried signs. When some in the group moved into a traffic lane, officers in riot gear forced people out of the street. Some demonstrators threw water bottles and other debris at officers.

More on this...

• High tension, state of emergency in Ferguson 1 year later

• Ferguson One Year Later

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that police began to make arrests at around 10 p.m. local time. At that point, the newspaper estimated, there were approximately 50 reporters, 75 cops, and 150 protesters at the scene. At least nine people were accused of resisting or interfering with an arrest. The paper reported that more arrests were made after midnight Tuesday.
Belmar told The Associated Press: "They're not going to take the street tonight. That's not going to happen."
Ferguson resident Hershel Myers Jr., 46, criticized the police response as aggressive and unnecessary.
A military veteran, he added, "It's wrong for me to have to go overseas and fight with Army across my chest, but we can't fight on our own street where I live."
By 1 a.m., the crowd and police presence along West Florissant had been begun to diminish.
In all, approximately 144 protesters were arrested around the St. Louis area Monday. McGuire said that approximately 64 protesters who blocked afternoon rush-hour traffic on Interstate 70 Monday afternoon were arrested. At midday, 57 protesters demanding the dissolution of the Ferguson Police Department were arrested near the federal courthouse in St. Louis.
On Monday morning, prosecutors announced filing of ten felony charges against Tyrone Harris Jr., whom Belmar said opened fire on officers after an earlier shooting on West Florissant late Sunday. The four officers in the van fired back, then pursued the suspect on foot. The suspect again fired on the officers when he became trapped in a fenced-in area, the chief said, and all four opened fire.
Harris was in critical condition Monday after surgery. All four officers in the van, each wearing protective vests, escaped injury. They were not wearing body cameras, Belmar said.
Harris' father called the police version of events "a bunch of lies." He said two girls who were with his son told him he was unarmed and had been drawn into a dispute involving two groups of young people.
Tyrone Harris Sr. told The Associated Press that his son was a close friend of Michael Brown and was in Ferguson on Sunday night to pay respects.
The elder Harris said his son got caught up in a dispute among two groups of young people and was "running for his life" after gunfire broke out.
"My son was running to the police to ask for help, and he was shot," he said. "It's all a bunch of lies ... They're making my son look like a criminal."
Online court records show that Tyrone Harris Jr. was charged in November with stealing a motor vehicle and a gun, as well as resisting arrest by fleeing. A court hearing in that case is scheduled for Aug. 31.
Belmar said the suspect who fired on officers had a semi-automatic 9 mm gun that was stolen last year from Cape Girardeau, Missouri.
The police chief drew a distinction between the shooters and the protesters.
"They were criminals," he said of those involved in gunfire. "They weren't protesters."
Gov. Jay Nixon agreed, saying in a statement that such "reprehensible acts must not be allowed to silence the voices of peace and progress."

? Cartoon

With Social Security disability fund going broke by 2016, Congress set for partisan, election-year showdown

The 11 million Americans who receive Social Security disability face steep benefit cuts next year unless Congress acts.
Social Security's trustees say the disability trust fund will run out of money in late 2016, a presidential election year, which would trigger an automatic 19 percent cut in benefits.
GOP lawmakers see the funding crisis as an opportunity to improve a program that they believe is plagued by waste and abuse. Democrats sat that the program’s modest benefits keep millions of disabled workers and their families out of poverty.
Lawmakers from both political parties would like to resolve the issue this year, protecting beneficiaries from steep cuts before presidential politics consumes the capital. But a deal remains elusive as Social Security approaches its 80th birthday on Friday.
President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act on Aug. 14, 1935. The disability program was added in 1956.
The average monthly payment for disabled workers and their families is $1,019. That comes to $12,228 a year. A 19 percent cut would lower the average annual benefit to less than $10,000.
Social Security is self-financed by a 12.4 percent tax on wages up to $118,500. Workers pay half and employers pay half. Social Security also gets revenue from taxes on benefits and interest on the program's two trust funds.
Last year, the wage tax generated $756 billion. By law, the tax revenue is divided between the disability trust fund and Social Security's much larger retirement fund. The retirement fund gets about 85 percent of the money, and the rest goes to disability.
Over the past 20 years, the fund balances have gotten out of whack. The retirement fund has enough money to pay full benefits until 2035, according to the Social Security trustees. But they disability fund is projected to run out of money in fourth quarter of 2016.
Congress could redirect tax revenue from the retirement fund to the disability fund, as it has done in the past. The last time was in 1994.
If Congress redirects the tax revenue, the retirement fund would lose one year of solvency, so both the retirement program and the disability program would have enough money to pay full benefits until 2034.
Republicans say that simply redirecting the tax revenue would be taking money from retired workers to pay disabled workers -- robbing one fund to finance another.
Also, Republicans say they want changes in the disability program to reduce fraud and to encourage disabled workers to re-enter the workforce.
Democrats say they too want to reduce fraud and to encourage disabled workers who can work to re-enter the workforce. But they accuse Republicans of manufacturing a crisis by refusing to redirect tax revenue between the trust funds.

Congress faced with passing a long term Transportation bill after August recess

When is a highway bill not about a highway bill?
When it’s about Iran, de-funding Planned Parenthood and sanctuary cities.
And when it’s about an obscure Washington institution called the Export-Import Bank, Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals, the tax code, the federal deficits and the August congressional recess.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, is fond of saying members of Congress conduct policy in a political setting. And the calisthenics over the past few weeks on the highway bill attests to his thesis.
“Republicans don’t know how to get a transportation bill done,” charged House Democratic Caucus Chairman Xavier Becerra, California, a few weeks ago.
Federal highway dollars expired at the end of July, and Congress again rushed to plug the dyke. For starters, the House approved a five-month bill to keep federal transportation programs afloat in mid-July. Then the Senate crashed through a six-year, bipartisan bill authored by Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla., and the top Democrat on the panel, Sen. Barbara Boxer, California.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., championed the effort, scheduling a rare Sunday session to help expeditiously complete the legislation before sending it to the House just before the start of the lengthy August recess.
But other issues intruded. Major bills often assume the mantle of “Christmas trees” right before major congressional recesses. That’s because lawmakers attempt to adorn those bills with every possible legislative bauble and ornament available. That’s where de funding Planned Parenthood came in. There was sanctuary cities tinsel. Export-Import Bank bubble lights and garlands for the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Call it Christmas in July.
But McConnell knew better than to be distracted by the shiny objects if he was going to wrap up his longer-term bill. He permitted but two decorations on this tree: one important to Democrats and one crucial for Republicans.
One amendment would reauthorize the Export-Import Bank, which helps American firms conduct business abroad and that expired in June. The other would repeal the Affordable Care Act.
Neither has anything to do with funding highway construction programs. But sometimes that’s the cost of doing business in the United States Senate. And, the spare ornamentation might actually help senators complete the bill and not find other distractions.
Conservatives such as Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, immediately flayed McConnell.
He decried the ObamaCare de-funding effort as a “show vote” -- particularly since stripping dollars for the health care program didn’t have the support to clear a procedural hurdle let alone become part of the highway bill.
Meantime, it was clear from the outset that the Ex-Im Bank commanded enough yeas to clear the procedural threshold and be attached to the legislation.
The Senate approved the bill -- wishing the House might entertain it before its members fled the Capitol for August. But House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., promptly squelched those hopes.
“We are not taking the Senate bill,” declared McCarthy, fretting about dumping a 1,000-page bill on his members just days before escaping the Beltway.
At that point, the House had already approved an interim highway bill stretching through mid-December. But the House GOP brain trust then rolled out a three-month patch through late October. The House was slated to depart Washington on July 30. But the House quickly approved the three-month measure, and McCarthy cut everyone loose a day early on July 29.
Ironically, even though the House was out of session on July 30, dozens of House members were spotted walking around the Capitol complex that day. Many had important meetings scheduled and didn’t want to cancel them.
Still, McCarthy’s opportune departure gambit achieved four objectives:
First, it jammed the Senate with the House’s short-term highway bills. It was a take-it-or-leave it proposition. Either the Senate would swallow hard-to-pass stopgap plans or highway programs would go belly-up at the end of July. It would be the Senate’s fault and nobody could hang the responsibility on the House.
Secondly, the maneuver absolved the House of having to immediately consider the Senate’s version of the highway measure. Members of Congress from both sides seemed all right with that, despite the bipartisan structure of the Senate legislation. House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer, D-Md., noted his opposition of the Senate package and echoed McCarthy’s calendar concerns.
“In the short time that we have available, it would be not possible to consider that bill in any depth,” he said. “Certainly the Senate doesn't expect us to take a 1,000-page bill and just, you know, no questions asked and pass it and send it to the president.”
Third, the House’s decision to skip town on the Senate and its highway measure also protected its members from a nasty political skirmish.
Remember the Ex-Im Bank? Eliminating the institution is a cause celebre for the Republican right. Both the House and Senate let its charter expire at the end of June -- even though there’s sufficient, bipartisan support to renew the institution in both bodies of Congress.
The procedural vote on Ex-Im in the Senate scored a whopping 67 yeas. The vote in favor of the actual amendment racked up 64 ayes. But there’s a conservative, Tea Party-aligned core of House members who are repulsed at the prospect of reauthorizing the bank. They would have immediately balked at the Senate highway bill on those grounds alone. Any potential changes to the Senate’s bill -- including stripping out Ex-Im -- could have protracted the process and prompted the House to send an altered bill back to the Senate.
Fourth, this effort preserves a conservative policy goal. Ex-Im remains mothballed. That empowers House conservatives to return to their districts during the August recess and affirm that the Export-Import Bank is dead.
For now.
Boehner’s long expected the Senate to include a provision to reauthorize the bank in a “must-pass” piece of legislation. A long-term highway bill could constitute such a vehicle.
And even though highway programs are on life support now through late October, the onus is now on the House to author a bona fide highway measure, pass it and huddle in a House/Senate conference committee this autumn to arrive at a final, merged bill to send to President Obama.
Still, even some House Republicans want to salvage the Ex-Im Bank.
The House Rules Committee is the final gateway to the floor for most pieces of legislation. An effort to renew the bank surfaced on a rather obscure, but noteworthy vote on the night of July 28 as the GOP prepped its three-month highway measure for debate the next day.
Rep. Stephen Fincher, R-Tenn., backs the Export-Import Bank and drew up an amendment to extend its life through the fall of 2019. The Rules committee rejected the inclusion of Fincher’s amendment in debate on the emergency highway bill, but only by 7-to-6 vote.
That vote is important because members of the committee serve at the pleasure of the House speaker. The committee is set up in a way to always favor the leadership -- which for now isn’t willing to reauthorize Ex-Im.
And on the vote to include the Fincher amendment, GOP Reps. Steve Stivers, Ohio, Dan Newhouse, Washington, bucked the rest of the Republicans on the panel.
They voted yes along with all Democrats, which triggered the close vote in the Rules committee. It’s been years since the committee has experienced such a tight tally on a major issue -- and significant that not one but two GOPers voted against their fellow Republicans.
At his final press conference before the August respite, Boehner was asked by reporters about a final resolution to the highway bill when lawmakers reconvene in September.
“I’m confident as we get into this fall we’re going to have pretty smooth sailing,” chirped Boehner with a smirk, drawing laughter from the press corps.
Perhaps the “smooth sailing” refers to solving actual highway policy issues. Settling all of the ancillary topics are the real challenge -- because it’s obvious the debate so far about the highway bill hasn’t been about the highway bill.

Fiorina: Breakout debate performance has sparked 'uptick' in financial support

Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina said Sunday that her breakout performance during the last week’s debates has created a surge in support and that she can ascend to win the party nomination.
“The truth is the race has just started,” Fiorina, a former Hewlett-Packard chief executive, told “Fox News Sunday.” “It’s game on.”
Fiorina failed to qualify for the prime-time Fox News Channel debate Thursday night for the top-10 ranked GOP candidates. So she competed with the seven others in a forum before the main event.
Still, just the exposure was key to her campaign because as a first-time presidential candidate she lacked name recognition, Fiorina said.
“It was a big night for me,” she told Fox. “Only 40 percent of Republicans had heard my name. … There’s been an uptick in financial support, in support generally.”
Nevertheless, Fiorina, the only major female candidate in the 2016 Republican field, will have a tough time breaking into the top tier or winning the nomination, considering she has consistently ranked among the last in most major polls.
And she is ranked 13th among 15 candidates with 1.3 percent of the vote, according to the most recent averaging of polls by the nonpartisan website RealClearPolitics.com
Beyond the problem of name recognition, Fiorina will continue to have to defend her tenure at Hewlett-Packard where she laid off 30,000 employees and was eventually fired.
On Sunday, Fiorina argued, as she has since the start of the campaign, that she kept the company alive in the post-9/11 and dotcom bubbles.
“Sometimes, in tough times tough calls are necessary,” she said, adding she was fired in a “board room brawl.”
Fiorina said she will continue to do what she has since the start of the race, attack the top candidates, Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton, and work hard on the campaign trail.
She said Trump has "no excuse" for attacking Fox new anchor Megyn Kelly for her tough questions to him during the debate.
"There’s no excuse for this," she said. "It’s her job to ask tough questions."
Fiorina, whose platform includes cutting the size of government and economic growth through the support of small business, also said: "I’m throwing every punch. ... I’m going to keep working hard, keep doing what I’ve been doing since day one -- keep talking to people and answering their questions.”

Gun battle during Ferguson anniversary protest ends with man shot by police

St. Louis County's police chief said a man opened fire on plainclothes detectives late Sunday before being pursued and shot by the officers after a day of peaceful demonstrations in Ferguson marking the anniversary of Michael Brown's death.
Chief Jon Belmar did not identify the suspect, whom he said was in "critical, unstable" condition at a local hospital. However, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch identified the man as 18-year-old Tyrone Harris Jr. Harris' father, also named Tyrone, told the paper that his son had just come out of surgery early Monday, and noted that his son and Michael Brown "were real close."
Belmar said that officers had been tracking the man, whom they believed to be armed, during the protest. He said the man approached the detectives, who were sitting in a van, and opened fire. The officers returned fire from inside the vehicle before pursuing the man on foot. Belmar said the man shot again at the officers, all four of whom returned fire.
The man who fired on officers had a semi-automatic 9MM gun that was stolen last year from Cape Girardeau, Missouri, according to the chief.
The officers have been placed on administrative leave, in keeping with standard practice after police-involved shootings. Belmar said none of the officers, who have between 6 and 12 years of experience, was seriously injured.
The shooting took place at approximately 11:15 p.m. local time as several hundred people gathered on West Florissant Street.
Belmar told reporters at a news conference early Monday that a second shooting involving two groups of people happened on the west side of West Florissant Avenue just before the police-involved shooting. Belmar said that between 40 and 50 shots were fired in an exchange that lasted approximately 45 seconds, an amount he described as "remarkable." There was no immediate word of any casualties from that shooting.
"They were criminals. They weren't protesters," Belmar said of those involved in the shootings.
"There is a small group of people out there that are intent on making sure that peace doesn't prevail," he added. "There are a lot of emotions. I get it. But we can't sustain this as we move forward."
At the time of the shootings, observers told the Post-Dispatch that fewer than 100 protesters remained on the streets and were outnumbered by members of the media. However, the few protesters who remained were blocking traffic and confronting police. One person threw a glass bottle at officers but missed.
For the first time in three consecutive nights of demonstrations, some officers were dressed in riot gear, including bullet-proof vests and helmets with shields. One officer was treated for cuts related to a brick thrown at his face, Belmar said. Police made an unknown number of arrests and at one point early Monday shot smoke to disperse the crowd that lingered on West Florissant, he said.
The gunfire marred a day of largely peaceful protest on the anniversary of the killing that shone a national spotlight on relations between the police and black communities across America. Brown's father, Michael Brown Sr., led a march through town after a crowd of hundreds observed 4 1/2 minutes of silence.
The group began their silence at 12:02 p.m., the time Brown was killed, for a length of time that symbolized the 4 1/2 hours that his body lay in the street after he was killed. Two doves were released at the end.
The elder Brown then held hands with others to lead the march, which started at the site where his son, who was black and unarmed, was fatally shot by Ferguson officer Darren Wilson on Aug. 9, 2014. A grand jury and the U.S. Department of Justice declined to prosecute Wilson, who resigned in November, but the shooting touched off a national "Black Lives Matter" movement.
Pausing along the route at a permanent memorial for his son, Michael Brown Sr. said, "Miss you."
He had thanked supporters before the march for not allowing what happened to his son to be "swept under the carpet."
Later, a few hundred people turned out at Greater St. Mark Family Church for a service to remember Brown, with his father joining other relatives sitting behind the pulpit. Anthony Gray, a Brown family attorney pressing a wrongful-death lawsuit against Ferguson, Wilson and his former police chief, suggested that justice will be served on Michael Brown's behalf.
Gray told the crowd: "You knew in your gut that (the shooting) wasn't right. And you knew what that officer did was unjustified."
The two-hour commemoration, featuring a mime dance and a rap-infused version of "Lean on Me" peppered between reflections about Brown, thinned as it wore on. Roughly 50 still remained by the time Michael Brown Sr. was finally handed the microphone to thank attendees and close out the event, saying, "This movement is going to be a good movement."
Organizers of some of the weekend activities have pledged a day of civil disobedience on Monday, but have not yet offered specific details.
Earlier, at the march, some wore T-shirts with likenesses of Brown or messages such as "Please stop killing us" or "Hands up! Don't shoot!" which became a rallying cry during the sometimes-violent protests that followed the shooting a year ago.
But the focus of the weekend has largely been on Brown, who graduated from high school weeks before the shooting and planned to go to trade school to study to become a heating and air conditioning technician.
Relatives and friends described Brown as a quiet teen who stood around 6-foot-3, weighed nearly 300 pounds and was eager to start technical college. But police said Brown stole items from a convenience store and shoved the owner who tried to stop him on the morning of Aug. 9, 2014. Moments later, he and a friend were walking on Canfield Drive when Wilson, who is white, told them to move to the sidewalk.
That led to a confrontation inside Wilson's police car. It spilled outside, and Wilson claimed that Brown came at him, menacingly, leading to the fatal shooting. Some witnesses claimed Brown had his hands up in surrender. Federal officials concluded there was no evidence to disprove testimony by Wilson that he feared for his safety, nor was there reliable evidence that Brown had his hands up in surrender when he was shot.
The shooting led to protests, some violent, and the unrest escalated again in November when a St. Louis County grand jury determined that Wilson did nothing wrong. He resigned days later. The November riots included fires that burned more than a dozen businesses.
The Justice Department reached the same conclusion in March, clearing Wilson. But in a separate report, the Justice Department cited racial bias and profiling in policing as well as a profit-driven municipal court system that often targeted black residents, who make up about two-thirds of Ferguson's populace.
Ferguson's city manager, police chief and municipal judge resigned within days of that report. All three were white. The new judge, interim city manager and interim police chief are all black. (Racist City)

Trump digs in, plows ahead, Trump hits Bush on his fundraising, Trump: 'I said nothing wrong whatsoever'

Donald Trump gave no ground on Sunday, insisting his crude remarks appearing to imply Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly was menstruating when she questioned him during the first Republican presidential debate were anything but.
Three weeks after two of his rivals demanded he quit the race for the GOP presidential nomination and three days after a record 24 million viewers tuned into the GOP debate in Cleveland that many establishment Republicans predicted might be the beginning of the end for him, Trump is still center stage.
And although his longtime political strategist, Roger Stone, left over the weekend, Trump offered few hints his campaign was in disarray. The master-of-shock has plowed through other recent controversies — suggesting undocumented Mexican immigrants were rapists and questioning Sen. John McCain’s standing as a war hero — and come away with even stronger polling numbers as he taps into wide-spread dissatisfaction with Washington’s political class.
“I said nothing wrong whatsoever,” Trump declared on CNN’s “State of the Union” two days after he had said of Kelly on CNN: “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her — wherever.”

Billionaire real estate developer Donald Trump criticized Republican rival Jeb Bush on Sunday for his lucrative fundraising, while vowing to be immune from outside influences should he be elected president.
“These are not people that are putting it up because they like the color of his hair,” Trump said on ABC’s “This Week,” referring to reports that the former Florida governor raised more than $100 million in early campaign funds. “These are people that are putting it up because they want something, and they’re going to get something.”
Trump, who says he plans to fund his own campaign for the GOP presidential nomination, appeared eager Sunday to pivot from his harsh criticism of Fox News host Megyn Kelly, which sparked a new round of outrage that he is sexist. He also sought to wave off claims that Republicans do not trust him because he’s shifted views on his past support of a single-payer health care system and some other issues, and he tried to position himself again as someone who can shake up the Washington establishment.
Trump claimed his promised resistance to lobbyists and donors is “one of the reasons that I’m killing everybody in the polls.” Still, his campaign has been thrown into damage control after his remarks about Kelly, who was one of the Fox moderators at Thursday’s GOP debate in Cleveland and has a strong following among conservatives.

Donald Trump is not backing off his harsh criticism of Fox News host Megyn Kelly and denies he suggested she was menstruating when asking him tough questions at the first Republican presidential debate.
“I said nothing wrong whatsoever,” Trump said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
In the first of several call-ins to the Sunday morning news shows, the billionaire real estate developer and entertainer said he was referring to Kelly’s nose when he said on CNN Friday: “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her — wherever.”
“Only a deviant” would suggest his remarks were sexist, Trump said. “Only a sick person would even think about it.”

 

Taken From: Politico      http://www.politico.com/p/pages/2016-elections/

Biden Cartoon

Trump battles criticism from rivals, former campaign aide

It sounds like Republicans want to cherry-pick someone as the nominee.

ATLANTA (AP) — Donald Trump is showing no signs of curbing his battle with a Fox News television host, the Republican Party establishment and several presidential primary rivals who are accusing him of disrespecting women

Even a former Trump campaign aide suggests that the businessman's bid for the White House has become a side show.

Trump's unconventional, insurgent campaign has excited many anti-establishment conservatives while confounding Republican Party leaders already facing the prospects of a bruising fight among 17 candidates.

The latest controversy started Thursday night when Fox News debate moderator Megyn Kelly recounted Trump's history of incendiary comments toward women. Angry over what he considered unfair treatment at the debate, Trump told CNN on Friday night that Kelly had "blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever." That remark cost Trump a prime-time speaking slot at the RedState Gathering, the Atlanta conference where several other presidential candidates spoke to about 1,000 conservative activists.

RedState host Erick Erickson said in a statement that Trump had violated basic standards of decency, even if his bluntness "resonates with a lot of people." The Trump campaign retorted by calling Erickson a "total loser" who backs other "establishment losers."
Jeb Bush, the presidential favorite for many top Republican donors, said at RedState that Trump's bombast would hurt the GOP's chances with women, who already tilt toward Democrats in presidential elections. "Do we want to win? Do we want to insult 53 percent of our voters?" the former Florida governor asked.

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FILE- In this Aug. 6, 2015, file photo, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks to the …

A parade of other candidates criticized Trump as well. Mike Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor, seemed exasperated by it all, at one point snapping at reporters after being asked several Trump-related questions. "I'm running for president," he said. "I'm not running for social media critic of somebody else who's running for president."
By Saturday evening, Trump's campaign announced that he had fired one of his top campaign consultants. Roger Stone retorted on Twitter that he'd "fired Trump," not the other way around. According to an email obtained by the Associated Press, Stone wrote to Trump, "The current controversies involving personalities and provocative media fights have reached such a high volume that it has distracted attention from your platform and overwhelmed your core message."
Trump's campaign manager said he never received that message.
Among RedState attendees, opinions varied about whether Trump should be criticized for the remark he made about Kelly. But if there was anything close to a consensus, it was that the activists still want to hear from Trump and hope that other candidates heed his rise.

"It sounds like Republicans want to cherry-pick someone as the nominee," said Jane Sacco of New Port Richey, Florida, who was angry at Erickson's decision to dump Trump. "And," she added, "they want everyone to fall in line."

Black Lives Matter activists push Sanders off stage at Seattle event

Sanders Takes a back Seat.

Black Lives Matter activists stole the spotlight away from Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders on Saturday in Seattle, prompting Sanders to leave without giving his speech.
Sanders was just about to address several thousand people who gathered shoulder to shoulder at Westlake Park when two women took over the microphone. Organizers couldn’t persuade the two to wait and greed to give them a few minutes.
The women spoke about Ferguson and the killing of Michael Brown. They also held a four minute moment of silence.
When the crowd asked the activists to allow Sanders to speak, one activist called the crowd "white supremacist liberals," according to event participants.
After waiting about 20 minutes while the women talked, Sanders was pushed away again when he tried to take the microphone back. Instead, he waved goodbye to the crowd and left the stage with a raised fist salute. He shook hands and posed for photos with supporters for about 15 minutes, and then left.
“I am disappointed that two people disrupted a rally attended by thousands at which I was invited to speak about fighting Social Security and Medicate,” Sanders said in a statement later Saturday. “I was especially disappointed because on criminal justice reform and the need to fight racism. There is no other candidate who will fight than me.”
Sanders did end up speaking to a crowd Saturday night at the University of Washington campus about his commitment to criminal justice reform as well as addressing income equality.
He addressed the protesters' concerns in his speech saying, "No president will fight harder than me to end institutional racism and reform the criminal justice system. Too many lives have been destroyed by war on drugs, by incarceration; we need to educate people. We need to put people to work."
Saturday afternoon's fireworks weren't the first time Black Lives Matters activists disrupted the Vermont senator’s event.
Last month in Phoenix, protesters affiliated with the movement took over the stage at a Phoenix event and disrupted an interview with Sanders and former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley.
In his campaign, Sanders has chiefly focused on issues like the middle class, climate change and criminal justice reform. In addition to advocating a $15-an-hour minimum wage and raising taxes on the rich, Sanders also supports a massive government-led jobs program to fix roads and bridges, a single-payer health care system, an expansion of Social Security benefits and debt-free college.
Sanders will hold a campaign rally at the University of Washington this evening. He will be driving to Portland on Sunday and is scheduled to hold a Sunday night rally at Portland's Moda Center, which has a capacity of about 19,000 and is home of the NBA's Portland Trail Blazers. The event had originally been scheduled at Veterans Memorial Coliseum, which can handle about 12,000.
Sanders heads to an event in Los Angeles on Monday.

Clinton campaign Abedin's history at State Department poses liability for Clinton White House bid

Anthony Weiner's Wife.

Huma Abedin -- a close aide to Hillary Clinton at the State Department and now a top campaign official -- is facing more questions about her activities at the agency, causing potential problems for Clinton’s presidential bid.
A federal judge ordered the State Department to have Clinton, Abedin and Cheryl Mills, another Clinton aide when she was secretary of state, confirm they have turned over all government records and describe how they used Clinton’s private server to conduct official business.
They had until Friday to turn over the information “under penalty of perjury.”
Clinton is already facing questions about using the server and private email accounts while she was the country’s top diplomat from 2009 to 2013.
The former secretary of state has turned over about 55,000 pages of private emails but deleted those she deemed personal, resulting in voters increasingly doubting her trustworthiness, according to recent polls.
Some emails show the extent to which Clinton's closest aides managed the details of her image. Abedin, for example, sent her an early-morning message in August 2009 advising Clinton to "wear a dark color today. Maybe the new dark green suit. Or blue."
Clinton later held a joint news conference with the Jordanian foreign minister. She wore the green suit, according to The Associated Press.
Abedin has for months been facing scrutiny about being part of a controversial State Department program that allowed her to work part time at the agency and have a private sector job.
She went from full-time deputy chief of staff for Clinton to a part-timer, then started working for Teneo, a consulting firm led by former President Clinton aide Douglas Band.
The agency’s inspector general’s office this spring confirmed an investigation on the matter and on email exchanges between Abedin and Clinton.
Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has since 2013 led the effort to learn more about Abedin’s time at the State Department.
Last week, he sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry and others asking about an investigation into possible “criminal” conduct by Abedin over her pay and her possibly violating rules that govern vacation and sick time.
The purported State Department inspector general report found Abedin was overpaid by nearly $10,000 because she violated such rules while at the agency.
The 39-year-old Abedin, vice chairwoman of the Clinton campaign, is contesting the findings and has requested an administrative review of them, while her lawyer calls the report “fundamentally flawed.”
The Clinton campaign did not respond to a request Saturday for comment.
Abedin is married to former New York Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner, who resigned from Congress in 2011 over a sexting scandal.
Larry J. Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, told The Washington Times that only political insiders will even know Abedin's name.
“But she's another building block in the image of Clinton being conveyed to voters," he said. "More and more, the current Clinton campaign is starting to remind me of the Clintons in the 1990s. At times, their controversies came in waves and filled news pages. It's happening all over again for Hillary in this campaign."
Abedin made roughly $69,000 in the first quarter of 2015, which would put her on  pace to make $276,000 this year, according to news outlets’ analysis of federal reports.
The inspector general’s office has declined to respond to a request by FoxNews.com to verify the existence of the Abedin report and its finding.
Grassley and his staffers are also having problems getting information from the office.
And on Wednesday, he vowed to try to block -- or “place a hold” -- on the nomination of David Malcolm Robinson to become the State Department’s assistant secretary for conflict and stabilization operations until the agency complies with inquiries from the Republican-controlled Congress.
“The nominee is an innocent victim of the State Department’s contemptuous failures to respond to congressional inquiries,” Grassley said.