Justice Department: No criminal charges for Lerner, others in IRS scandal

The Justice Department announced Friday afternoon that it will not bring criminal charges against Lois Lerner or any other IRS official involved in the targeting of Tea Party groups, in a decision Republicans ripped as a "free pass." 
In a letter to leaders of the House Judiciary Committee, the department said the investigation into the controversy will be closed -- and while they found "mismanagement, poor judgment and institutional inertia," they found "no evidence that would support a criminal prosecution."
"What occurred is disquieting and may necessitate corrective action -- but it does not warrant criminal prosecution," Assistant Attorney General Peter J. Kadzik wrote.
Republicans, who themselves have investigated the IRS scandal for years, fumed over Friday's DOJ decision.
Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said the move marks a "low point of accountability" for the Obama administration.
"Giving Lois Lerner a free pass only reinforces the idea that government officials are above the law and that there is no consequence for wrongdoing," Issa said in a statement.
Some Republicans had called for a special counsel to be assigned to the case, complaining that the investigation was led by a Democratic donor. Among them, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., on Friday warned that "politicization continues to go unchecked by this Administration and a Justice Department charged with pursuing wrongdoing."
Mark Meckler, co-founder of Tea Party Patriots and leader of Citizens for Self Governance which is suing the IRS, called the DOJ letter a "whitewash and miscarriage of justice."
But Democrats held up the findings as evidence that Republicans were on a witch hunt, with Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., ripping GOP colleagues for spending money on "all kinds of investigative rabbit holes."
The IRS firestorm erupted more than two years ago with an inspector general's audit that said IRS agents had improperly singled out Tea Party and other conservative groups for extra scrutiny when they applied for tax-exempt status during the 2010 and 2012 elections.
The disclosure set off investigations by the Justice Department and multiple congressional committees, which focused in large part on former official Lerner's role.
The House voted to hold Lerner in contempt of Congress last year after she refused to answer questions at two House Oversight hearings. She has since retired.
The investigations into Lerner featured many unusual twists and turns, including a controversy over an apparent hard drive crash that sent investigators scrambling to recover messages and the release of emails that showed Lerner making disparaging comments about Republicans.
The DOJ letter sent Friday said Lerner used "poor judgment" in using her IRS email account to send personal messages voicing "political views," but said they found no evidence that she exercised her official authority at the IRS in a "partisan manner generally" or that political views influenced her actions with regard to the tax-exempt applications.
The letter further said they found "no evidence" that any IRS official acted based on political or other motives that would support criminal prosecution.
Rather, the DOJ said they found a "disconnect" between employees at the Cincinnati office, where IRS workers vetted the applications, and those in Washington, D.C. The letter said "no one person" was responsible, pinning the blame for the "ill-advised" and "burdensome" process instead on "discrete mistakes by line-level revenue agents" and others -- whose mistakes, according to the DOJ, were "exacerbated" by leadership lapses in D.C.

Missing Money? Report questions how states spent ObamaCare funds

The federal government awarded over $5 billion to help states set up ObamaCare exchanges, with the vast majority – $4.6 billion – going to 16 states and Washington, D.C. 
But, according to a recent Government Accountability Office (GAO) report, much of that money has not been accounted for – and yet not returned, either.
So where did those taxpayer dollars go?
That’s the billion-dollar question.
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) required the establishment of health insurance exchanges – known as marketplaces – to help small employers and consumers compare and purchase insurance plans. States opted to either develop their own state-based exchanges or hand authority to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). And between 2010 and 2014, CMS awarded federal grants mostly to states setting up their own marketplaces, to help them get started.
About $4.6 billion was given to these 17 recipients, including California, New York, Washington state and Kentucky.
But the GAO report found that so far, just $1.4 billion of that has been spent on IT projects, and a total of $3 billion has been “spent or drawn down,” though not all the spending is detailed.
That, then, leaves at least $1.6 billion unaccounted for. Yet only three states returned any portion of the money – a total of just over $1 million was given back.
“[T]he specific amount spent on marketplace-related projects was uncertain, as only a selected number of states reported to GAO that they tracked or estimated this information,” the report said.
Even though states were supposed to set up their marketplaces by the end of last year, they are not yet legally required to return unused funds.
Chuck Young, with the GAO, explained that the grants also could have covered non-IT costs not addressed in the study, and the funding devoted to IT projects will generally remain available for states’ use until December – albeit with restrictions. “CMS said that, since March 2015, states may have spent additional grant funds for IT projects, re-purposed those funds for non-IT costs, or returned funds,” he said, adding that the office expects to conduct a follow-up to this report.
But in an article on the GAO report by the American Spectator, health care adviser and contributor to the publication David Catron highlighted the monetary discrepancy and raised the question of whether Democratic officials improperly diverted or spent more than $3 billion in taxpayer grant money.
“It’s hard to know with any degree of certainty where the money went,” he told FoxNews.com. “So all we know with any confidence is how much was awarded, how much went to IT and what the difference is.”
Catron pointed out that 85 percent of federal funds went to Democrat-controlled states, and that only three states returned any money to CMS while the remaining 13 states and D.C. have yet to return any funds.
The spending is different from state to state. Oregon has withdrawn just over $293 million of its $305 million and spent almost all of the $78.5 million authorized for its IT expenses – but based on the report, has not returned any leftover funds. California was given over $1 billion and spent $709 million. GAO found that less than a half-million dollars has been returned to the federal government.
Representatives for the Department of Health in Oregon told FoxNews.com that the IT funds listed on the report were only one part of setting up the exchange, implying that remaining funding was directed elsewhere. A spokesperson for the ObamaCare marketplace Covered California said that when they released the 2015-2016 budget in June, there was approximately $100 million in federal funds left and carried it over thanks to an extension by the federal government; they now have until the end of December to draw on the funds for the program.
A representative for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services insisted that if any funds are misallocated the CMS “will work to recover the funds using remedies available under law and regulation.”
“To safeguard taxpayer funds, HHS has also put in place additional program integrity regulations and has implemented, or is in the process of implementing, the GAO’s recommendations,” said HHS senior adviser Meaghan Smith.
In examining how states have used federal funds for IT projects and CMS’s role in overseeing them, the non-partisan GAO found that marketplaces reported spending nearly 89 percent of the funds on “IT contracts,” but that the CMS is still trying to track states’ IT spending in more detail.
The GAO urged CMS to improve its existing oversight roles and responsibilities and ensure that senior executives adequately review and approve funding decisions.
And despite all the money issued to states specifically for IT use, the GAO underscored an array of problems – from poor system performance to software and hardware problems – plaguing the state-based and federally run marketplaces.
According to Dennis Santiago, risk analyst and director of the Bank Monitor Division for Total Bank Solutions, the uncertainty doesn’t necessarily mean the money was misused.
“What is missing is the proof that diversions did or did not occur, and if so where,” he said. “IT costs are only part of the process. It could be legitimate, classic pocket lining at work – or some of both.”

'Serial liar': Families of Benghazi victims blast Clinton on Benghazi

Michael Ingmire watched as Hillary Clinton was grilled for 11 hours Thursday about the 2012 attack in Benghazi that left his nephew and three other Americans dead and saw not a future president, but a "serial liar."
As a congressional panel pressed the former Secretary of State over the attack on the consulate facility in the Libyan city, Ingmire, uncle of Sean Smith, and relatives of former Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty watched from their homes, hoping Clinton's testimony would yield answers about why additional security was not granted and why she initially blamed the attack on a YouTube video instead of a coordinated act of terrorism.
"The thing that was shocking – one of the pinnacle moments – was the revelation she told her family there was a terrorist attack while she told America something else," Smith's uncle, Michael Ingmire, told FoxNews.com. "Mrs. Clinton is a serial liar."

"Mrs. Clinton is a serial liar."
- Michael Ingmire, uncle of Sean Smith

Smith, an information officer, and Woods, a former Navy SEAL, died along with Doherty and U.S. ambassador Chris Stevens when Islamic militants stormed the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi and set it ablaze before attacking a nearby CIA compound with machine guns and rockets.
Stevens, the first U.S. Ambassador killed in the line of duty since 1979, had repeatedly asked the State Department for increased security at the consulate prior to the attack but his requests were not granted.
In the hours following the attacks, the Obama administration learned they were carefully planned assaults by Al Qaeda-related militants but Clinton and others would go on to tell a different tale: an anti-Muslim YouTube video caused spontaneous protests and angry mobs were to blame for the attacks.
"So if there's no evidence for a video-inspired protest, then where did the false narrative start?" Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan asked Clinton during the hearing Thursday.
"It started with you, Madam Secretary," he said. "You could live with a protest about a video, that won't hurt you, but a terror attack would."
Clinton rejected Jordan's claim, describing the situation in the hours after the attack as "fluid" and the details unclear.
"I am sorry that it doesn't fit your narrative congressman, I can only tell you what the facts are," Clinton said.
During the marathon hours of questioning -- which Democrats claim was a partisan attack on the Democratic presidential frontrunner -- Clinton said Stevens understood the risks involved and that his requests for additional security never crossed her desk.
"Those requests for security were rightly reviewed by the security professionals," Clinton told the committee. "I did not see them. I did not approve them. I did not deny them."
Clinton also described Stevens as a friend, saying the 52-year-old ambassador "understood that most people in Libya or anywhere reject the extremists' argument that violence can ever be a path to dignity or justice."
"I knew and admired Chris Stevens," she said in her opening remarks Thursday. "He was one of our nation's most accomplished diplomats. Chris' mother liked to say he had 'sand in his shoes,' because he was always moving, always working, especially in the Middle East that he came to know so well."
But Clinton's closeness to Stevens was called into question by Rep Susan Brooks, R-Ill., who asked: "Did you ever personally speak to him after you swore him in in May? Yes or no please."
"Yes, I believe I did," Clinton replied. "I don't recall."
Ingmire described Clinton's choice of words about Stevens as jarring.
"How could she say 'Chris thought this' and 'Chris felt that' when she basically had nothing to do with him?" Ingmire said.
Tyrone Woods' father, Charles, recalled meeting Clinton when his son's body arrived at Andrews Air Force Base two days after the attacks.
"I gave Hillary a hug and shook her hand and she said, 'We are going to have the filmmaker arrested who was responsible for the death of your son," Woods said, reading the account from his journal.
"That was a complete bald-faced lie," he told FoxNews.com Friday. "The day after the attack, she was talking to the Prime Minister of Egypt and she said the attack in Libya had nothing to do with the video."
Smith's mother, Patricia, gave a similar account, saying she was told by the administration "it was a video when they knew it was not a video."
"They told me lies," she said Friday. "My son told me the night before that he has been asking for security and he hasn’t heard anything."

Racist Cartoon

Obama vetoes $612 billion defense policy bill in rebuke to GOP

WASHINGTON –  President Obama vetoed a sweeping $612 billion defense policy bill Wednesday in a rebuke to congressional Republicans, and insisted they send him a better version that doesn't tie his hands on some of his top priorities.
In an unusual veto ceremony, Obama praised the bill for ensuring the military stays funded and making improvements on military retirement and cybersecurity. Yet he pointedly accused Republicans of resorting to "gimmicks" and prohibiting other changes needed to address modern security threats.
"Unfortunately, it falls woefully short," Obama said. "I'm going to be sending it back to Congress, and my message to them is very simple: Let's do this right."
The rare presidential veto marked the latest wrinkle in the ongoing fight between Obama and Republicans who control Congress over whether to increase federal spending — and how.
Four years after Congress passed and Obama signed into law strict, across-the-board spending limits, both parties are eager to bust through the caps for defense spending. But Obama has insisted that spending on domestic programs be raised at the same time, setting off a budget clash with Republicans that has yet to be resolved.
To side-step the budget caps, known in Washington as sequestration, lawmakers added an extra $38.3 billion to a separate account for wartime operations that is immune to the spending limits. The White House has dismissed that approach as a "gimmick" that fails to deal with the broader problem or provide long-term budget certainty for the Pentagon.
Obama also rejects the bill as written due to provisions making it harder for him to transfer suspected terror detainees out of the military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a key campaign promise that Obama is hard-pressed to fulfill before his term ends. The White House has also expressed concerns over provisions preventing military base closures and funding equipment beyond what the military says it needs.
But Republicans lambasted Obama for prioritizing the domestic spending he seeks over the security of U.S. troops and the nation they protect.
"This is the worst possible time for an American president to veto their national defense bill, and especially to do so for arbitrary partisan reasons," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on the Senate floor.
The veto forces Congress to revise the bill or try to settle the larger budget dispute. Although Republicans have vowed to try to override Obama's veto, the White House insisted it was confident it had the votes to ensure Obama's veto stays in place.

Fruit fiasco: High school students face punishment for "racist" fruit basket

A Texas school district has its kumquats in a twist over a fruit basket they considered to be racially insensitive.
The Humble Independent School District’s fruit fiasco has resulted in investigations, punishments and national media coverage.
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The hullabaloo started on Oct. 16 when the marching bands from Atascocita High School and Summer Creek High School exchanged gifts before a football game.

The youngsters from Atascocita gave their counterparts a Halloween basket that included canned pineapple, a whole coconut, a small watermelon and some candy. An adult sponsor for the band raised concerns and those concerns were forwarded to school administrators.

“It is a tradition for student representatives of competing schools to exchange gifts on the field at varsity football games,” public information officer Robin McAdams said in an email to me.
The youngsters from Atascocita gave their counterparts a Halloween basket that included canned pineapple, a whole coconut, a small watermelon and some candy. An adult sponsor for the band raised concerns and those concerns were forwarded to school administrators.
“School Administrators conducted an investigation and after considering the totality of circumstances, determined that the gift was inappropriate and lacked good sportsmanship,” McAdams told me. “Atascocita High School will not tolerate racial insensitivity.”
My goodness – who knew the Piggy Wiggly produce aisle was wrought with such racial animus?
Several of the students involved told Houston-area television stations they did nothing wrong.
“I’m mixed race,” senior Alyssa Taylor told ABC13. “I don’t take offense to that. How can someone else take offense?”
There are reports that some of the students involved may be kicked out of the band and others may face In School Suspension.
“It’s just not fair, not fair,” parent Hector Andaverde told the television station.
The school district said their investigation determined a few of the students “discussed that the watermelon could be perceived as racially offensive and should not be included in the gift.”
The watermelon? Really? That’s the racially offensive fruit? My money was on the coconut.
Assistant Superintendent Trey Kraemer wrote in a letter to parents that Summer Creek’s band members were “confused by the nature of the exchange.”
“Typically, these gifts contain snacks such as crackers, candy and popcorn that can be readily shared among students and eaten during the game,” he wrote.
Quite frankly, I take offense at the assistant superintendent’s use of the word ‘cracker.’ I prefer to be called a Saltine-American.
School administrators say they are working to implement procedures to prevent future offensive fruit exchanges.
I’m hoping the school district will announce a blue ribbon panel to once and for all determine which fruit is racially acceptable.
Off hand, I’d be suspicious of pomegranate, kiwi and those dancing raisins in the Motown song, “Heard it Through the Grapevine.
And why stop at the produce aisle?
It’s possible that some LGBT students might take offense at a box of Fruity Pebbles. Hispanic band kids could take offense at being served salsa. And what greater insult is there than to serve lactose intolerant kids a bowl of Blue Bell Ice Cream?
This is indeed an issue that must be addressed – lest we offend this perpetually offended generation and their fragile psyches.
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.

Clinton seeks to turn page on Benghazi after testimony – but can she?

Hillary Clinton, after a grueling day of testimony before the congressional Benghazi committee, made clear she hopes to at last move beyond the controversy that has dogged her presidential campaign.
The former secretary of state -- no doubt looking to avoid missteps that could reverberate on the trail -- was visibly measured Thursday as she spent 11 hours defending her role before, during and after the attacks. And she repeatedly cited past investigations, suggesting there’s little more to uncover.
Whether Clinton gets her wish remains to be seen.
Ultimately, analysts suggested the hearing might not move the dial much either way – Republican critics continued to voice frustration Thursday at her responses, while congressional Democrats spent the better part of the day defending her.
"In the short-term, this has probably not changed the minds of anyone watching the proceedings,” Republican strategist Ron Bonjean said.  
That may have been all Clinton could hope for.
She entered the committee room Thursday at the end of an important week for the campaign – a day earlier, Vice President Biden, who had been considering a 2016 bid and could have posed the biggest primary threat to her candidacy, announced he would not run. This came after she delivered what was widely regarded as a strong debate performance last week.
But even if her testimony doesn’t change many minds, the former secretary of state’s detractors likely will find plenty of fodder in her hearing responses.
Though Democrats complained the hearing turned up nothing new, Clinton did acknowledge Thursday that, even as she received frequent emails from friend Sidney Blumenthal, the late Ambassador Chris Stevens did not have her personal email address.
Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, also said that as the administration was blaming an anti-Islam video for motivating the attackers, Clinton was telling the Egyptian prime minister they knew the attack was “planned” and had “nothing to do with the film.”
Retired Gen. Jack Keane, a Fox News analyst and former Army vice chief of staff, cited that exchange and said “that’s news that obviously she didn’t believe that the film was part of the motivation for the attack.”
The hearing, though, only muddied the public understanding of what Clinton believes to this day. While Clinton blamed the “fog of war” for confusion in Benghazi, on Thursday she also continued to assert that the video may have motivated some attackers.

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Democratic presidential candidate, former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Oct. 22, 2015, before the House Benghazi Committee. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

More broadly, though, Clinton drew frustration from Republicans by repeatedly skirting blame for her department’s denial of security requests for Stevens and his team. Stevens and three other Americans were killed in the Sept. 11, 2012, attacks.
Clinton testified to the Benghazi committee that the security requests were handled by security professionals in the department and not her.
"I did not see them. I did not approve them. I did not deny them," she said.
Clinton acknowledged some of his requests were approved, and others were not. But she said Stevens emailed regularly with her close aides and “did not raise security with the members of my staff.”
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee swiped at Clinton on Twitter as she rebuffed accusations before the committee.
“.@HillaryClinton coming clean to #BenghaziCommittee seeming abt as likely as me getting a Che Guevara tattoo on small of my back! #Benghazi,” he tweeted.
Clinton, though, tried to walk a fine line. Even as she denied responsibility for the rejected security requests, she said she’s assumed responsibility in a general sense and tried to make changes at the department before she left.
And she challenged the notion that she was out of touch with the situation on the ground.
“I’ve lost more sleep than all of you put together” over Benghazi, she said.
Notable is that while Clinton and her campaign used the run-up to Thursday’s hearing to accuse the panel of being a Republican partisan tool, Clinton mostly avoided a confrontational tone during her testimony.
Instead, she sat back as Democratic and Republican members battled – at times shouted at – each other over the credibility of the committee itself.
Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., the committee's top Democrat, said the panel was only formed because Republicans "did not like the answers" from prior investigations. So, he said, they established the committee and "set them loose, Madam Secretary, because you're running for president." Cummings called it an "abusive effort to derail" her campaign.
But Chairman Trey Gowdy, R-S.C., denied this. Of allegations that the investigation is all about Clinton, Gowdy said Thursday, "Let me assure you it is not."
When asked by reporters at the end of the 11-hour hearing if Clinton's testimony helped reach a conclusion, Gowdy said the work of the congressional Benghazi committee is not yet over.
"I don't draw conclusions till the end, and there are more witnesses to talk to," he said.

‘Obvious flight risk’: Toddler's brutal beating prompts call to withhold bail from illegal immigrants

When Francisco Javier Chavez posted bail on charges of beating a California toddler within an inch of her life in late July, there was little reason to expect the illegal immigrant, who has spent much of his adult life hopping back and forth across the Mexican border, would return to face justice.
Two weeks later, at his scheduled arraignment on Aug. 13, Chavez was a no-show. The 27-year-old career criminal had put up $10,000, or 10 percent of the amount set for his alleged crimes by California's bail schedule. His disappearance is hardly a surprise to critics who believe violent illegal immigrants are, by definition, flight risks who should be denied bail in such serious cases. They say judges, especially in border states plagued by illegal immigrant crime, are naive or worse if they expect suspects who regularly cross in and out of Mexico to take the U.S. justice system seriously.
“Frankly, judges grant bail in cases like these because they are being foolish,” said Hans A. von Spakovsky, a former Justice Department lawyer now at The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies. “The judge can consider bail for you when you are charged with a crime, but does not have to let you out on bail. If the state can show you are a flight risk, you should not get bail. If the state can show you are a danger to the public because of a history of violence, you should not get bail.”

“Frankly, judges grant bail in cases like these because they are being foolish.”
- Hans A. von Spakovsky, Heritage Foundation’

While Chavez is in the wind, his alleged victim, the 2-year-old daughter of his live-in girlfriend, is now in foster care, paralyzed from the beating that also left her with both arms and a femur broken. Well before he was arrested in San Luis Obispo County for attacking the child, Chavez had compiled a lengthy criminal record that includes assault and drug convictions and arrests for violent acts such as kidnapping, car-jacking and cruelty to a child. He was deported in February 2014, but as in previous instances, found it easy to sneak back across the border and into the U.S.
Weeks after Chavez slipped out of custody, on Sept. 1, another 2-year-old toddler named Jonathan Montez was run down and killed in San Bernardino County. Illegal immigrant Jose Enrique Vasquez, 53, an unlicensed driver who witnesses said was speeding down the child’s residential street, fled the scene, according to authorities. He was arrested two weeks later, and, like Chavez, was granted bail.
Vasquez also has compiled a lengthy criminal record under various aliases, including charges of spousal abuse, battery of a peace officer, driving without a license, driving under the influence and armed robbery. But other charges in his criminal record might have given a judge pause in considering bail according to critics, including failure to appear in court, possession of false citizenship documents and eight deportations for illegally entering the country.

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Jonathan Montez was just 2 when he was run down and killed in San Bernardino County. An illegal immigrant was charged in his death.

The systems for granting bail in state courts varies from state to state. California's bail system lays out prescribed amounts for various crimes as a guideline for law enforcement and judges, but judges retain discretion to raise the amount in cases where the suspect is a flight risk or a danger to the public and the district attorney can add, drop or change the charges. Two states, Alabama and Missouri, have passed laws that preclude bail for illegal immigrants suspected of serious crimes, while judges in other states -- notably Texas -- weigh illegal status in making their decisions. But last year, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Arizona's 2006 law banning bail for illegal immigrant suspects violated their right to due process and amounted to punishment before trial. The 11-member panel's decision called the law a "scattered attempt" to deal with the problem of chronic bail-skipping by illegal immigrants. Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to consider the lower court's decision.
Judges everywhere maintain discretion to deny bail to anyone they believe is likely to flee justice, yet they often fail to consider illegal status as a factor, said Jessica Vaughan, director of policy studies for the Center for Immigration Studies. And critics say it should be obvious that someone here illegally and suspected of a violent crime will bolt rather than face justice, especially in border states such as California, where they can be out of the country an hour after posting bail.
“Aliens who commit acts of violence should not be released on bail, because they are clearly a danger to the public, and when we have someone with this kind of deportation history, clearly they are an obvious flight risk,” said von Spakovsky. “These judges are making mistakes granting bail to illegal aliens – reckless mistakes that endangered the public.”
The willingness of judges to grant bail to illegal immigrants charged with serious crimes compounds the ongoing controversy involving so-called sanctuary cities. Such jurisdictions, either by local statute or practice, refuse to inform federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents when an illegal immigrant is detained.
But even jurisdictions that do not implement sanctuary policies believe that two federal court rulings, the 2013 California “Trust Act,” which limits “cruel and costly immigration hold requests in local jails,” and an ambiguous White House policy all bar them from holding illegal immigrants who have posted bail until federal authorities can collect and deport them – even if ICE asks them to via what is known as a “detainer request.”
The American Civil Liberties Union has sued jurisdictions that attempted to honor the ICE detainers, and the Department of Justice has not intervened in the cases to underscore its support of them. As a result, local law enforcement agencies say they have no choice but to let even violent illegal immigrant suspects walk once they are granted bail.
“Yes, the judges who ignore this risk are at fault, but Congress provided ICE with a tool to address the problem -- detainers -- which the Obama administration is not allowing its officers to use,” Vaughan said.
In the cases of both Chavez and Vasquez, ICE issued detainer requests. In Chavez’s case, ICE agents did not arrive prior to bail being posted. In the case of Vasquez, ICE isn’t immediately taking custody or deporting Vasquez, so that he remains in the U.S. at least resolving the legal proceedings surrounding the hit-and-run charge.
Don Rosenberg, who, after his 25-year-old son Drew was killed by an unlicensed immigrant driver in San Francisco five years ago, began closely tracking illegal immigrant crime, said the biggest problem he sees is “people in power don’t care.” He blames judges for granting bail, but also holds law enforcement accountable for caving in to the threat of lawsuits.
“How can anyone who in law enforcement let people like this out of custody who we know will likely hurt someone badly, if not kill them, even if they are threatened with a lawsuit?” Rosenberg said. “It’s pure callous indifference. I don’t know how they live with themselves.”

Syrian Cartoon

Republican mounts uphill bid to be first Navajo in Congress

In a crowded Arizona race, one Republican quietly is trying to make history as the first Navajo elected to Congress.
His name is Shawn Redd, and he faces an uphill battle in the race for Arizona’s 1^st District House seat. Not only is he entering the GOP primary a clear underdog – in a race packed with better-known figures like local Sheriff Paul Babeu – but Navajo historically vote Democrat.
That means Redd can’t necessarily rely on their support in a primary, or a general election. As he explained to Fox News, Redd is taking a chance by running under the GOP flag.
“Republicans have been intimidated by Navajo Nation. They have been unsuccessful campaigning for votes and have given up,” Redd told Fox News. “I’m going extremely hard against the grain, because for people in the 1^st District, voting Democrat is a way of life.”
On the reservation, Redd is known as “Shawn the Republican.”
A 35-year-old small business owner born into a Navajo-Mormon family, he said many in Navajo Nation have encouraged him to run for office – just not as a Republican. But he said “that’s just not who I am.”
The congressional race opened up when Arizona Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, a Democrat, announced she would challenge Republican Sen. John McCain in his quest for a sixth term in the U.S. Senate, leaving her traditionally GOP-leaning seat in Arizona’s 1^st District up for grabs.
The district is almost 25 percent Native American, and Redd claims he can pick up support from some of them.
“I know our message resonates,” he said. “With the personal relationships that I have with thousands of people among Navajo Nation and the twelve other tribes, there is no doubt that I will fracture the native vote, and if I fracture the native vote, the Democrats will not win.”
But he’d first have to win the primary. And according to Jim Small, editor of the Arizona Capitol Times, he’s an underdog with a big fight ahead.
“He’s got an uphill climb to be competitive in this race, just to put it bluntly,” Small said. “He’s an unknown running as a Republican in that district.” Small described Redd’s task as “incredibly difficult … assuming he can even raise the money to mount a credible campaign.”
Redd is running in the primary against Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu; Arizona House Speaker David Gowan; former Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett; and Gary Kiehne, a 2014 candidate.
Though Redd has not held public office, he claims his legislative experience is extensive within the Tribal Council, specifically in regards to issuing license plates for Navajo Nation.
“The other candidates are established and well-accomplished,” Redd said. “But I think nationwide, the party is looking for new blood.”
Redd says he’d bridge the district’s racial divide and be a champion for economic development needed in rural Arizona.
As for Sheriff Babeu, who is a frequent commentator in the media on immigration enforcement and other issues, he’s launching his second bid for the 1^st District seat.
“I’m looking forward to a spirited race over the next year,” the sheriff told Fox News. “I will put my record as a sheriff committed to reducing crime and illegal immigration against anyone in this race. Now it’s time to send a sheriff to Congress.”
The Republican primary is not open to Democrats. So, as few in Navajo Nation are Republicans, few could actually vote in the GOP primary.
“I don’t think the Navajo Nation will be a deciding factor in the primary,” Small told Fox News. “But in the general election, they can swing it; just like they have done in the past.”

Security officials acknowledge 'risk' in admitting Syrian refugees into US

Top law enforcement and security officials cautioned Wednesday that bringing in 10,000 Syrian refugees as planned carries a terror risk, with Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson acknowledging background checks can only do so much and "there is no risk-free process.”
“The good news is that we are better at [vetting] than we were eight years ago. The bad news is that there is no risk-free process,” Johnson said at a House Homeland Security Committee hearing.
The Obama administration has committed to bringing in 10,000 Syrian refugees in fiscal 2016, as part of a total 85,000 worldwide refugees.
However, at the hearing on “Worldwide Threats and Homeland Security Challenges,” officials said while they are confident about their vetting process, there is a risk in terms of screening refugees who have never crossed the intelligence radar.
“If the person has not crossed our radar screen, there will be nothing to query against so we do see a risk there,” FBI Director James Comey said.
“It is not a perfect process. There is a degree of risk attached to any screening and vetting process. We look to manage that risk as best we can,” Nicholas Rasmussen, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, said.
“We may have someone who is not on our radar and someone may choose to do something bad after they get here,” Johnson said. “We can only query against what we have collected, so if someone hasn’t made a ripple in the pond, we can check our databases until the cows come home but we have no record on that person.”
However, Johnson said the system in place is “a good system,” and noted that the process also includes a personal assessment for each refugee. “It’s not just simply what’s in a public record,” Johnson said.
The testimony reflects the challenge ahead for the administration, as it tries to respond to a global refugee crisis fueled by the Syrian civil war and other conflicts. Aid groups and other governments had urged the United States to accept more refugees, who mostly have fled to neighboring Middle Eastern countries and Europe, and the administration agreed to accept more.
Republican lawmakers continued to voice concerns at Wednesday's hearing.
“My concern is that you’re relying upon them and what they say or what they write out in an application and you can’t go beyond that,” Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, said. “So you’re having to take their word for it.”
South Carolina Rep. Jeff Duncan said his constituents were "very concerned about our inability to vet properly the refugees that are coming."
“I just want to encourage you all … to rethink the resettlement of refugees in this country, especially in the numbers I’m hearing," Duncan said.
Addressing the ISIS threat more generally, FBI Director Comey also said that the number of Americans going abroad to join ISIS has fallen in recent months. Comey said the FBI is aware of six Americans trying to join the group in the last three-and-a-half months, in contrast to the approximately nine each month they were seeing before that.
However, he said he could not explain the reduction, and noted the group’s use of social media has allowed them to successfully “break the model” of terror recruitment.
“ISIS has used that ubiquitous social media to break the model and push into the United States into the pocket, onto the mobile devices, on troubled souls throughout our country in all 50 states, a twin message, ‘Come or Kill,’” Comey said.

Ryan wins support of key conservative bloc for speaker run

Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan gained support from a key group Wednesday night for House speaker when a supermajority of the House Freedom Caucus announced it was backing him.
In a statement, the group said Ryan "has promised to be an ideas-focused Speaker who will advance limited government principles and devolve power to the membership."
While the group held off an official endorsement of Ryan, the announcement of support could get him to officially enter the race for House speaker, and lock down the votes to win in elections next week.
Ryan said in a statement Wednesday night the move by the Freedom Caucus "is a positive step toward a unified Republican team.”
Ryan had met behind closed doors with members earlier in the day. When he left the meeting, he told reporters, “Nice meeting. We had a good chat.”
Support from the caucus was not certain, since they've repeatedly opposed GOP leaders and pushed House Speaker John Boehner to announce his resignation. Before Ryan entered the mix, the caucus previously had endorsed Rep. Daniel Webster of Florida, who said late Wednesday he was still in the running.
On Tuesday, Ryan let his Republican colleagues know that if he's to become the next House speaker, he'll do so on his own terms -- or not at all.
After initially turning down the job, the Wisconsin congressman outlined a set of significant demands that would need to be met in order for him to run:

• He wants broad support across the Republican conference, specifically the endorsement of all the major caucuses.
• He wants House rules changed to overhaul what is known as the "motion to vacate the chair" -- a parliamentary weapon members can use to try and oust a speaker.
• He wants to be able to spend time with his family, and not be on the road as much as previous speakers.

Ryan, outlining these conditions, then gave colleagues until Friday to express their views. And he made clear that if he doesn't get what he wants, he'd be "happy" to stay where he is, as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee.
The statement put out by the House Freedom Caucus Wednesday night does not technically count as an endorsement, since members fell short of the 80 percent requirement for one. However, about two-thirds of the caucus members did come out in favor of Ryan, leading to the Wednesday night statement.
Boehner told the House Republican Conference on Wednesday that they will vote internally for speaker on Oct. 28, followed by a full floor vote on Oct. 29.
In total, Ryan or any candidate would need roughly 218 votes to win the speakership.
On Tuesday, Ryan said, "My greatest worry is the consequence of not stepping up."
He said the country is in "desperate need for leadership."
At the same time, he made clear he could back out.
"What I told the members is if you can agree to the requests, and if I can be a truly unifying figure, I'll serve," Ryan said. "And if I'm not a unifying force, that will be fine as well. I'm happy to stay where I am."
While his conditions may be steep, multiple sources told Fox News that GOP leaders and others pushed Ryan so hard that he felt he had to at least get to this point, and outline the conditions for a run.
Those same sources also say Ryan has engineered a way out if necessary, by making significant demands that are hard to meet. If Ryan ultimately does not enter the race, it's unclear who might step up to run for the job -- and more importantly, who would be able to muster 218 votes.

GOP, Democrats maneuver for position ahead of Clinton's appearance before Benghazi committee

Both the GOP and Democrats maneuvered for position ahead of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's long-awaited appearance Thursday before the Benghazi panel, where she is expected to be closely quizzed about her actions during the 2012 assault in Libya that left four Americans dead.
While fireworks could erupt, Clinton will certainly try to avoid showing her frustration, as she did before a Senate panel in 2013, saying, "What difference, at this point, does it make?" referring to the motivation of the Benghazi attackers who killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three others.
Committee Chairman Rep. Trey Gowdy and the six other Republicans on the panel were expected to be equally measured, considering the partisan onslaught that followed House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy suggestion last month that their investigation had hurt Clinton’s polls numbers.
Additional comments by New York Republican Rep. Richard Henna and a GOP investigator on the committee suggesting an over-focus on Clinton has resulted in her team continuing to say the panel is a partisan tool with “zero credibility.”
Gowdy, a South Carolina Republican and former prosecutor, insists the panel has always been about getting all of the facts related to the four deaths, which includes Clinton’s actions “before, during and after” the assault.
Among the likely questions are whether she properly addressed Stevens’ email request for increased security and told U.S. military units to “stand down” during the attacks.
House Speaker John Boehner, who formed the committee in May 2014, on Tuesday defended the probe, amid accusations that it is a taxpayer waste lasting longer than the congressional Watergate investigation.
“Today, the State Department turned over 1,300 pages of printed documents from Ambassador Stevens' emails.” he told Fox News. “Today. They've been stonewalling us now for three years on giving us the documents that we need.”
He also argued Clinton was the country’s top diplomat during the attack and that the committee was set up to “get to the truth about what happened.”
Boehner, Gowdy and other House Republicans also point out that the committee discovered this spring that Clinton, as secretary of state, used a private server and email accounts for official business. They also say that repeated questions about the controversial setup are related to the attacks, not to create headlines.

Jeb Cartoon

Trump’s 9/11 sparring with Bush: The left piles on Jeb’s brother

Donald Trump’s criticism of Jeb Bush’s brother over the 9/11 attacks is resonating strongly with one group:
Liberals.
They are more than happy to seize the moment and blame George W. Bush for the worst terrorist attack in our nation’s history.
Take MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, who is pumped up over the Trump offensive: “The Democrats never had the stones to go out and challenge George W… because they probably felt that would be un-nice. Trump isn’t un-nice, he’s willing to be tough.”
Brad Woodhouse, a former Democratic Party spokesman, sent out an email saying “Trump is right about 9/11.” That linked to a liberal piece in the Atlantic with the same headline.
Any fair review of what happened would conclude that the Clinton and Bush administrations shared responsibility for the attacks that claimed the lives of 3,000 Americans. The intelligence failures over the al-Qaeda plot, which had been in the works for years, certainly predate Bush, who had only been in office for eight months. But it’s also true that the classified presidential daily briefing on Aug. 6, 2001 warned Bush: “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.”—and there were other warnings as well.
In pure political terms, Trump has shifted the campaign conversation in a way that hurts Jeb. The more time that Jeb spends talking about 2001, the less time he spends talking about the future. And the more time he spends defending his brother, the more he reminds voters that he is the third Bush to seek the White House—which undermines Jeb’s “I’m my own man” theme.
This has become a Trump specialty, to jab at his rivals with a provocative comment that forces them to spend days counterpunching.
The contretemps began with a television interview on Bloomberg, when Trump said this about the 43^rd president: “I mean, say what you want, the World Trade Center came down during his time.”
When anchor Stephanie Ruehl objected, Trump said people could blame Bush or not, but this was a fact: “The World Trade Center came down during his reign.”
That prompted Jeb to tweet that the billionaire’s comments were “pathetic.”
Since the Trump line contradicts Jeb’s narrative that his brother “kept us safe,” Bush stepped it up on CNN’s “State of the Union,” saying Trump is not serious when it comes to foreign policy: “Does anybody actually blame my brother for the attacks on 9/11? If they do, they’re totally marginalized in our society.”
But nobody this side of the conspiracy nuts is blaming George Bush for the attacks; some are saying (which was widely reported in the following years, though little remembered now) that his administration missed important signals and that law-enforcement and intelligence agencies failed to share information.
Trump elaborated Monday’s on “Fox & Friends” and Tuesday on CNN’s “New Day,” saying his tougher approach to immigration might have kept most of the hijackers out of the country. (This is debatable, as most of them had valid student and tourist visas.)
And the new focus on what was dubbed the War on Terror enabled Trump to pivot to Iraq, saying on CNN it was “just a disastrous decision” for the former president to launch that invasion and destabilize the Middle East.
Trump also told anchor Alisyn Camerota that “they knew an attack was coming. George Tenet, the CIA director, knew in advance there would be an attack, and he said so.”
It sounded at first glance like Trump might be wading into murky waters, but the key phrase is “an attack.” Tenet was indeed worried about an al-Qaeda attack—he insisted on a meeting with Condi Rice to press the point—but he didn’t know when and where, or that planes would be hijacked.
While liberals are jumping on this Trump bandwagon, some conservatives are upset. Fox’s Dana Perino, Bush’s former press secretary, accused Trump of peddling “liberal conspiracy theories.”
The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page, a major detractor, ran a piece titled “Trump’s 9/11 Truthing.” The headline is unfair because truthers are those who say the Bush administration was complicit in the attacks.
“Mr. Trump is now trying to blunt that rebuke by distorting the truth about the hijackers and the
Osama bin Laden era…Blaming George W. Bush for the 9/11 attacks is like blaming President Obama for the recession that followed the 2008 financial panic,” the Journal says. “The rise of al Qaeda had been going on for years, and its first attack on U.S. soil was its bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993.”
National Review, which is hostile to The Donald, published a column yesterday in which Jeb said Trump “echoes the attacks of Michael Moore and the fringe Left against my brother is yet another example of his dangerous views on national-security issues…
“Donald Trump simply doesn’t know what he’s talking about. And his bluster overcompensates for a shocking lack of knowledge on the complex national-security challenges that will confront the next president of the United States.”
‎
Perhaps it’s just a coincidence, but Mike Murphy, an 18-year Jeb adviser who runs his Super PAC, broke a long period of media silence by calling Trump “a false zombie front-runner. He’s dead politically, he'll never be president of the United States, ever. By definition I don't think you can be a front-runner if you're totally un-electable,” Murphy told Bloomberg.
So Jeb World is fully engaged. And since Bush’s interviews tend not to generate much news, maybe this has brought him more media attention than he’s gotten in weeks.
But he’s playing very much on Trump’s turf, and that has hurt. In the latest CNN poll, Trump hit 27 percent, and Bush is at 8—numbers that, however early, Jeb needs to find a way to change.

Ryan to run for House speaker if he gets full party support

Wisc. Rep. Paul Ryan told House Republicans Tuesday he would run for speaker if he gets broad support from all wings of the party and gave colleagues until Friday to express their views.
Speaking to reporters after a closed-door meeting with colleagues, Ryan said he had “made a few requests for what I think is necessary” and said he’d asked to hear back from them by the end of the week.
“What I told the members is if you can agree to the requests, and if I can be a truly unifying figure, I’ll serve,” Ryan said. “And if I’m not a unifying force, that will be fine as well. I’m happy to stay where I am.”
Saying the country was “in desperate need for leadership,” Ryan added, "My greatest worry is the consequence of not stepping up. Of some day having my own kids ask me, when the stakes were so high, 'Why didn’t you do all you could? Why didn’t you stand and fight for my future when you had the chance?"
At the same time, Rep. Jason Chaffetz of Utah said in a tweet he was dropping out of the race for speaker in favor of Ryan.
“I am out and supporting @RepPaulRyan for Speaker. Right person at the right time,” he tweeted.

More on this...

• Exclusive: John Boehner says it's time for him to 'move on'

Ryan, 45, the GOP's 2012 vice presidential nominee, had consistently said earlier he did not want to be speaker and would prefer to stay on as chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, which he's described as his dream job.
Outgoing House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, told Fox News’ Bret Baier Tuesday that he thought Ryan “would be a great speaker” and “has the skills to do this job.”

New York City police officer dies after being shot in East Harlem

A New York City police officer was shot and killed late Tuesday in the East Harlem section of the city after he responded to a report of shots fired and an armed robbery.
Police Commissioner Bill Bratton identified the murdered officer as Randolph Holder, 33, a five-year veteran of the force. Holder was an officer in the department's Housing Bureau, which polices the city's public housing developments.
"Tonight, he did what every other officer in the NYPD does," Bratton said. "When the call comes, he ran toward danger. It was the last time he will respond to that call."
Bratton said Holder and his partner responded to a report of shots fired at East 102nd Street on the city's Upper East Side. Witnesses told the officers a man had fled on a foot path and the officers encountered another man who told them an assailant had stolen his bicycle at gunpoint. Bratton said the officers confronted the suspect and pursued him to the intersection of East 120th Street and the FDR Drive, where gunfire rang out. One witness told Fox 5 that she heard at least five shots.
Holder was shot in the forehead and rushed to Harlem Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 10:22 p.m. Dozens of uniformed and plainclothes officers lined the hospital hallway while other officers held each other as they arrived.
"We are humbled by Officer Randolph Holder's example, an example of service and courage and sacrifice," Mayor Bill de Blasio said. "Our hearts are heavy. We offer our thoughts and our prayers to his family."
Bratton said the suspect was wounded in the shootout and apprehended four blocks away. The commissioner said the suspect, who has not been identified, was expected to be released from the hospital into police custody Wednesday. Three other man were also taken into custody and questioned.
Holder was a native of Guyana, where his father and grandfather both were police officers, Bratton said.
Patrolmen's Benevolent Association President Patrick Lynch said: "New York City police officers every day go out and carry themselves like superheroes. But the reality is when we're attacked, we bleed. When we bleed, we die. And when we die, we cry."
Holder is the fourth NYPD officer to die in the line of duty in the last 11 months.
On May 2, Officer Brian Moore was shot while questioning suspect Demetrius Blackwell in Queens. Moore died of his injuries two days later.
On December 20, detectives Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu were gunned down as they sat in their car in Brooklyn by Ismaaiyl Brinsley, who stated that he wanted to avenge the police-involved deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner by killing officers. Brinsley later shot himself in the head while fleeing police.
So far this year, 101 police officers have died in the line of duty in the U.S. -- 33 of those deaths caused by gunfire -- according to the Officer Down Memorial Page. By early Wednesday, Holder's name already had been added to the list.

Team Clinton on offense ahead of Benghazi committee hearing

Hillary Clinton and her supporters are blistering the Benghazi committee ahead of her much-anticipated testimony Thursday, repeatedly questioning the GOP-led investigative panel’s “credibility” as the former secretary of state gears up for a potentially confrontational appearance. 
On Wednesday, a super PAC supporting Clinton’s Democratic presidential campaign, Priorities USA, will begin running TV ads aimed at bolstering her image ahead of her appearance before the House Select Committee on Benghazi.
The effort marks the group’s first TV ad buy of the election cycle. But it is also just part of an all-out offensive that unexpectedly started Sept. 29 when House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy suggested the committee -- created to investigate the 2012 terror attacks in Benghazi, Libya -- has hurt Clinton’s poll numbers. Within days, New York Republican Rep. Richard Hanna and a GOP committee investigator also suggested the committee was too focused on Clinton, giving her and campaign officials an opening to call the panel a partisan tool.
“This committee is basically an arm of the Republican National Committee,” Clinton said to applause during last week’s Democratic primary debate. “It is a partisan vehicle, as admitted by … Mr. McCarthy, to drive down my poll numbers.” A few days earlier, Clinton told NBC the committee was “set up … for the purpose of making a partisan, political issue out of the deaths of four Americans.”
It's an allegation that Republican committee Chairman Trey Gowdy has adamantly denied, telling his Democratic committee counterpart as recently as Sunday that the committee "is not investigating Secretary Clinton" or the allegations surrounding her personal email use.
Whether the pre-hearing charges will lead to fireworks Thursday remains to be seen. Gowdy appears to be at pains to show his committee is only interested in getting at the truth regarding the Benghazi attacks, while Clinton publicly casts the panel as a partisan outfit. Clinton showed visible frustration during her 2013 Benghazi-related appearance on Capitol Hill, where she asked "what difference, at this point, does it make" what motivated the attackers. The Democratic presidential front-runner surely is mindful that such an unguarded moment on Thursday could become fodder for GOP ads in the 2016 cycle.
The committee itself was formed last year to investigate the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans at the U.S. diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, while Clinton was secretary of state.
The 12-member bipartisan committee discovered this March that Clinton used a private server and email accounts for official business while in office, which has led to an FBI investigation, several other congressional probes and widespread concerns about whether her unusual setup resulted in national security breaches.
Still, Gowdy says the committee is focused on Benghazi. He and Republican committee member Rep. Mike Pompeo, of Kansas, indicated Sunday they have no intentions of closing the investigation and in fact have dozens more witnesses and more information, including new Stevens’ emails.
“The ambassador asked for more security, and it was ignored,” Bradley Blakemen, former deputy assistant to President George W. Bush, said Tuesday.
However, Clinton supporters and others have called for shuttering the 17-month-old committee -- arguing it’s a political sham and a $4.5 million taxpayer waste.
“If you want to get to the truth, you might want to broaden your reach as opposed to … for political reasons, just going after Hillary Clinton,” Democratic strategist David Mercer told FoxNews.com on Tuesday.
Critics have more recently noted that Republican committee members recently summoned long-time Clinton aide-de-camp Huma Abedin to testify while thus far not doing the same for then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, then-CIA Director Gen. David Petraeus and others.
Clinton campaign spokesman Brian Fallon told reporters last week that Clinton would still testify but that Gowdy’s inquiry now has “zero credibility left.”
The counter-attacks have more recently focused on Gowdy. The Washington Post last week found an alleged connection between him and the STOP Hillary PAC that ran a controversial Benghazi ad during the Democratic debate, resulting in Gowdy returning $2,000 in contributions.
The South Carolina Republican and former state and federal prosecutor recently told Politico that the past few weeks have been among “the worst in my life.” In response to Republican non-committee members critiquing their work, he said over the weekend that they should “shut up.”
The hearing Thursday is expected focus in large part on whether Clinton, who in 2013 testified before Congress on Benghazi, adequately responded to concerns by Stevens about security at the Benghazi outpost.
Meanwhile, the Clinton campaign has produced several videos ahead of Thursday’s hearing including a five-minute highlight reel that touts Clinton’s "smart leadership” as secretary of state.

EPA Cartoon

GOP senator rips EPA, White House for skipping climate hearing

A top Republican senator is crying foul after the Environmental Protection Agency and a key White House office declined to take part in an upcoming hearing on the administration’s role in international climate negotiations, ahead of a landmark conference in Paris next month.
The Tuesday hearing was initially pitched as a joint hearing between the Committee on Environment and Public Works (EPW) and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (SFRC.) The hearing now is expected to be held only by the SFRC and to feature one witness -- the Obama administration's special envoy for climate change, Todd Stern.
Republican EPW sources told FoxNews.com that Democrats in the SFRC objected to a joint hearing, while invitations to the EPA and White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) were both declined. EPW Chairman Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., who is well-known for his global warming skepticism, voiced frustration at the response.
“The Obama administration and Senate Democrats have made it extremely difficult to provide necessary and appropriate Congressional oversight to the president’s international climate negotiations,” Inhofe said in a statement.
The hearing will be held in anticipation of the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris at the end of November. The conference is a critical summit for an administration that has made cutting carbon emissions a centerpiece of its second-term agenda. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest told reporters Monday that President Obama is considering attending the Paris talks.
Considering the summit's importance, Republicans want to question top environmental policy officials in the administration on their intentions.
“The CEQ has always been any administration's filter, and played a leadership role, on environmental issues and international environmental issues. The EPA is responsible for what we can tell to be the vast majority of the 26-28 percent of greenhouse gas reductions and yet we believe that ultimately this hearing will not feature the environmental agencies and will solely feature Mr. Stern,” a Senate EPW majority aide told FoxNews.com.
“We believe a hearing featuring all those witnesses would be useful, as witnesses have a tendency to defer to witnesses who are not in the room and it would be helpful to get a comprehensive perspective from the administration for the Senate of what will be part of this agreement, what has led up to this, what interagency interaction there has been, and the work involved.”
But in a letter responding to Inhofe, the EPA said the hearing would be out of the purview of the agency.
“[The] agency cannot speak to the full suite of domestic policies that are being considered in these negotiations and is not the party responsible for developing the total  emissions reduction numbers for the U.S.,” Associate Administrator Laura Vaught wrote.
While Tuesday's hearing will now be conducted solely by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, EPW Republicans said they want to hold their own hearing with Stern, the EPA and the CEQ later in the year. However, the State Department has informed the committee that Stern would not be able to attend an EPW hearing unless the EPA or CEQ also were in attendance.
The aide told FoxNews.com they consider scrutiny of the upcoming Paris agreement to be important, saying it would mirror the Kyoto agreement – which the U.S. did not ratify – and  require a substantial commitment to the international community.
The White House already has enlisted a number of companies to bolster its push for an international climate pledge
White House officials say 81 companies have signed on to the American Business Act on Climate pledge, including Intel, Coca-Cola, Google and Walmart. By signing, the companies promise to advocate for a strong climate deal ahead of the negotiations in Paris.

Ambassador sought security staffing before Benghazi attack, cable shows

Two months before the fatal 2012 terrorist attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi, then-Ambassador Chris Stevens requested 13 security personnel to help him safely travel around Libya, according to a cable reviewed by Fox News -- but he was turned down. 
In the July 9, 2012 cable, Stevens reported that, "Overall security conditions continue to be unpredictable, with large numbers of armed groups and individuals not under control of the central government, and frequent clashes in Tripoli and other major population centers." The cable said 13 security personnel would be the "minimum" needed for "transportation security and incident response capability."
But a congressional source said Patrick Kennedy, a deputy to then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, turned down the request.
The cable sent under Stevens' electronic signature shows that he was advocating for additional security and warning that the set-up did not meet State Department standards, as conditions deteriorated in the run-up to the attack that killed Stevens and three other Americans.
Clinton, now a Democratic presidential candidate, is set to testify Thursday before the congressional Benghazi committee at a hearing where the State Department's security measures in Libya are likely to be a focal point.
In the year leading up to the 2012 attack, records show, there were 234 security incidents in Libya, 50 of which took place in Benghazi -- including a June assassination attempt on the British ambassador in which a rocket-propelled grenade struck his vehicle. The team narrowly escaped.

More on this...

• New documents could shed light on Clinton's State Department

• Ambassador denied security before Benghazi attack

This attack preceded Stevens' July cable. While this intelligence was shared with the State Department, no additional security was added. The same month the British ambassador was targeted, there also was an IED attack on the U.S. Consulate, blasting a hole in the perimeter wall -- but still, security requests were denied.
According to a congressional source, a senior State Department security officer in Libya told Senate investigators that, in September 2012, he had to choose between guarding the Tripoli airport -- their lifeline to the outside world -- and sending security with Stevens to Benghazi.
He chose to reinforce the airport.
"The system is not working well. We've seen that, not on one occasion but on many occasions," said Adam Zagorin, with the Project on Government Oversight. "I'm not aware that it's been fixed as we sit here today."
Zagorin said there is a broader pattern of mismanagement when it comes to security and outside contracts.
"Patrick Kennedy, who is the chief administrator of the department, has testified on quite a number of occasions about this," he said. "And frankly it's not clear -- he has offered assurances and reassurance to members of Congress that this is being taken care of -- and yet the pattern repeats so one has to question what is really being done."
Further, the guard force at the Benghazi consulate, run by a contractor called Blue Mountain Libya, was in such disarray on Sept. 11, 2012, that they did not have a valid license to operate in Benghazi, according to emails obtained through a federal lawsuit.
Documents first obtained by Judicial Watch and reviewed by Fox News show the partnership was dissolved after a dispute between the Libyan license holder and the parent company in Britain. After the terror attack, the Libyan company said it was willing to "put its differences with the security operators, Blue Mountain UK, to the side for the moment, and shall allow the use of its security license. ... Our prayers are with the families of the victims," according to a Sept. 12 email to the State Department.
Despite the emails, the State Department has insisted there was no problem with the license.

George W. Bush reportedly rips Ted Cruz to Jeb Bush donors

Former President George W. Bush reportedly ripped into Texas Sen. Ted Cruz at a weekend gathering of donors to his brother's presidential campaign, according to a published report Monday. 
Politico reported that Bush said of Cruz, "I just don't like the guy," at the event, which was held Sunday night in Denver.
According to the report, which cited at least six donors who were at the event, Bush said he did not like Cruz's de facto alliance with Republican front-runner Donald Trump, who has notably spared Cruz from the criticism he has ladled onto other members of the 15-candidate Republican field.
"He said he found it 'opportunistic' that Cruz was sucking up to Trump and just expecting all of his support to come to him in the end," one donor told Politico when asked to describe Bush's remarks about Cruz. The report added that the former president had been engaging with amiable discussions about the state of the GOP race when Cruz's name came up.
"I was like, 'Holy s---, did he just say that?'" the donor told Politico. "I remember looking around and seeing that other people were also looking around surprised."
The report also said that Bush warned the donors to not underestimate Cruz's strength in the South and in Texas, where his message of religious liberty is expected to play very well with voters.
Freddy Ford, a spokesman for George W. Bush, did not deny that the former president had made the disparaging remarks about Cruz when asked to comment by Politico.
"The first words out of President Bush's mouth [Sunday] were that Jeb is going to earn the nomination, win the election, and be a great President ... He does not view Senator Cruz as Governor Bush's most serious rival."
Ford denied further requests by Fox News to address Bush's reported "I just don't like the guy" remark.
Cruz joined George W. Bush's presidential campaign in 1999 as a domestic policy adviser and helped put together the legal team that argued Bush v. Gore before the Supreme Court in the aftermath of the controversial election. He later served as an associate deputy attorney general in the Justice Department before becoming Solicitor General of Texas in 2003.
Cruz issued a statement to Politico late Monday that said in part, "It's no surprise that President Bush is supporting his brother and attacking the candidates he believes pose a threat to his campaign. I have no intention of reciprocating. I met my wife Heidi working on his campaign, and so I will always be grateful to him."

Israel arrests Hamas co-founder, accusing him of inciting recent violence

Israeli forces arrested one of the co-founders of the Hamas militant group Tuesday, accusing him of inciting recent violence that has resulted in the deaths of nine Israelis, many in stabbing attacks. 
The military said Hassan Yousef was arrested near Ramallah. It marks the most high-profile arrest since a wave of unrest swept through the region a month ago.
The military said Yousef had been "actively instigating and inciting terrorism" by encouraging attacks against Israelis. Military spokesman Lt. Col. Peter Lerner told the Associated Press, "Hamas' leaders cannot expect to propagate violence and terror from the comfort of their living rooms and pulpits of their mosques."
Yousef's eldest son, Mosab, spied for Israel between 1997 and 2007.
Over the past month, nine Israelis have been killed in Palestinian attacks, most of them stabbings. In that time, 41 Palestinians were killed by Israeli fire, including 20 labeled by Israel as attackers, and the rest in clashes with Israeli troops. An Eritrean migrant died after being shot and beaten by a mob that mistakenly believed he was a Palestinian attacker.
Also Tuesday, Israeli forces demolished the Hebron home of Maher Hashlamoun, a Palestinian who rammed his car into 25-year-old Dalia Lemkus in the West Bank and stabbed her several times last year Hashlamon was shot and killed.

More on this...

• Ambassador: Incitement by Palestinian leaders fuels violence

• Is media bias influencing coverage of violence in Israel?

Hashlamoun's wife told Palestinian radio that soldiers evacuated their three story building and demolished the third floor apartment where her family lived. Such demolitions are often carried out by Israeli forces with the aim of deterring future attacks.
Lerner said the demolition "sends a clear message that there is a personal price to pay when you are involved in terror."
Meanwhile, Palestinan Foreign Minister Riyad Malki told Palestinian radio that United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon would arrive in the region later Tuesday to meet with both Israeli and Palestinian leaders.
Ban has issued a video message ahead of the visit calling for calm on both sides. He said he understood the Palestinian frustration but that violence would only harm their legitimate aspirations. He said to the Israelis that he understood their concerns and fears due to the security deterioration, but added there was no military solution to the situation.
"When children are afraid to go to school, when anyone on the street is a potential victim, security is rightly your immediate priority," Ban said, addressing Israelis. "But walls, checkpoints, harsh responses by the security forces and house demolitions cannot sustain the peace and safety that you need and must have."

Iran Nuclear Cartoon