Newt Gingrich, Mary Mayhew: Hope for those trapped in welfare dependency -- Thanks to Trump

Republicans and members of the Trump administration must keep up the pressure and focus on achieving welfare reform.
When President Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, many believed that the law would indeed “end welfare as we know it.” It’s what we intended when Congress created the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program and implemented work requirements to restore welfare to its original intent as a springboard to self-sufficiency.
These policies were intended to be the beginning of welfare reform – the beginning of a nationwide policy focused on ending dependency. Instead, President Obama launched a war on the very thing we know is most successful at achieving this goal: work.
Over the past decade, too many of our fellow citizens have fallen deeper into the welfare trap, ensnared by government policies that pay people to not work. The so-called “War on Poverty” has left our nation with record-high levels of welfare enrollment – despite a 17-year record-low unemployment rate and more than 6 million open jobs across the country.

Over the past decade, too many of our fellow citizens have fallen deeper into the welfare trap, ensnared by government policies that pay people to not work.

Many of these new enrollees are able-bodied adults with no disabilities keeping them from working. They are not the individuals our welfare system is designed to aid – the disabled, the elderly, and others who are truly in need.
There are now nearly 21 million able-bodied adults dependent on food stamps – three times as many as in 2000. Some 28 million able-bodied adults are now dependent on Medicaid, quadrupling the number of those enrolled in 2000.
This is not what we envisioned in Congress – on either side of the political aisle – when we passed welfare reform in 1996 with bipartisan support. We included work requirements in the legislation because we knew the power of work. The reforms were compassionate – they gave people the opportunity to build better lives and create their own American dreams.
We know this not only because the research has proven it, time and time again, but because we’ve seen the transformational power of promoting work firsthand.
When Maine enforced time limits on its TANF program and refocused the program on employment and job training, it drew criticism from those on the left who called the reforms uncompassionate.
But the results spoke for themselves: Over the four-year period after the reforms, enrollees with records of prior earnings saw their wages increase by 237 percent on average. Throughout the duration of the evaluation period, these people dramatically increased their total earnings from $2.6 million to $8.6 million.
In October 2014, Maine began requiring able-bodied and childless adults who were receiving food stamps to work, train, or volunteer – at least part-time – in order to receive their benefits.
The reform drew criticism from the Obama administration – but once again, the power of work emerged. Those who left the program saw their incomes, on average, more than double within the first year, offsetting any lost welfare benefits. And the number of able-bodied adults receiving food stamp benefits fell from approximately 16,000 to 1,500.
But Maine was unfortunately the exception. Instead of empowering able-bodied adults to work to lift themselves out of dependency, most states implemented work requirement waivers, allowing adults to collect taxpayer-funded benefits without being required to work at all.
Loopholes have been exploited by federal and state bureaucrats who have robbed these able-bodied Americans of the opportunity to escape welfare and create better lives for themselves and their families.
Rather than viewing welfare as a temporary safety net, many government leaders have instead implemented policies that have turned welfare into a permanent trap.
Thankfully, President Trump’s recent executive order – Reducing Poverty in America by Promoting Opportunity and Economic Mobility – delivers a welcome policy change that offers hope to those trapped in welfare dependency.
The executive order lays the groundwork for federal agencies that administer welfare to prioritize work and encourage economic mobility, particularly for able-bodied adults. It reiterates the principle that those of us who have worked within the government know all too well: Government assistance is not the answer to ending poverty and dependency. Work is.
If Congress and agency leaders deliver on President Trump’s initiative, our welfare system can return to the truly compassionate policies of its past. Its success should once again be wholly measured by the number of people moved off the welfare rolls, not the number of people trapped on them. Only then will state successes like Maine’s become the norm rather than the exception.
Mary Mayhew served for six years commissioner of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, where she spearheaded transformational welfare reform. She currently serves as a senior fellow with the Opportunity Solutions Project.
Newt Gingrich is a Fox News contributor. A Republican, he was speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999. Follow him on Twitter @NewtGingrich. His latest book is "Understanding Trump."

Kanye West banned from radio station over recent comments

A Detroit radio station said it will ban Kanye West's music over controversial comments the rapper made earlier this week that slavery “was a choice.”
Hosts Shay Shay and BiGG of 105.1 the Morning Bounce made the announcement Thursday on Facebook with the hashtag “Mute Kanye.”
“Kanye has gone too far” with his latest comments, they said. They wrote that they are refusing to give him a platform,” according to New York Post.
"We don't want to hear Kanye's music, we don't want to play Kanye on our show, we don't want to talk about Kanye anymore,” the post read. “So we are taking a stand and we aren't playing his music anymore; we just are refusing to give him a platform."
The ban will be for the entire hip-hop station and will include tracks that West produced or is featured in as well, the Detroit Free Press reported.
West faced swift backlash following an interview with TMZ on Tuesday, where he said "when you hear about slavery for 400 years. For 400 years?! That sounds like a choice."
The music mogul took to Twitter shortly after to try and walk back his comments and compared himself to both Nat Turner and Harriet Tubman.

"when you hear about slavery for 400 years. For 400 years?! That sounds like a choice."

“If this was 148 years ago I would have been more like Harriet or Nat," West tweeted, before clarifying the reason he “brought up the 400 years point is because we can’t be mentally imprisoned for another 400 years. We need free thought now. Even the statement was an example of free thought…It was just an idea.”
The two morning DJs didn’t announce how long the ban will last, and left it open to a “gut feeling.”
“That’s what it is right now. We need a break,” Shay Shay, told the paper. “I think it’s a gut feeling of when we’ll be able to feel comfortable playing it again, when we’ll want to hear it again, and more importantly, when will our listeners want to hear it again.”
West was banned from a Hot 103.5 in Sacramento in 2016 after he attacked radio stations and fellow artists during a concert for his Saint Pablo Tour, USA Today reported. 

Fresh embarrassment for NBC as embattled network has to correct itself on Cohen wiretap story

For NBC News, it was another in a series of embarrassments on Thursday as it had to correct a story saying federal investigators had placed a wiretap on the phone lines of President Donald Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen.
As Fox News is reporting, the feds were monitoring only what calls were being made but weren’t listening in — contrary to NBC’s earlier reporting. The Peacock Network’s major turnabout was made more than four hours after the original story moved online Thursday, when it caused immediate chatter in the cable news universe.
NBC had attributed its original story to two anonymous sources with knowledge of the legal proceedings against Cohen. In an editor’s note preceding the rewritten story, NBC explains that three senior U.S. officials disputed the account, saying that the phones were monitored by a pen register, which records the phone numbers on both ends of the conversation, not the substance of the calls themselves.
The erroneous NBC report added to widespread speculation about what exactly the feds were able to seize in their April raid. Cohen’s lawyers and President Trump’s legal team have been battling in court over access to those materials.
NBC moved its original story online shortly after 1 p.m. on Thursday, and it became immediate fodder on MSNBC and other cable networks. The correction was issued online at 5:27 p.m. with that editor’s note, and was discussed on MSNBC’s “Meet the Press Daily.”
The correction offered ammunition to the nation’s highest-ranked media critic: Trump has frequently criticized the mainstream media for catering to America’s left wing and coastal elite with “fake news.”
The screw-up also gave media watchdogs a chance to mock NBC online for its latest blast of “fake news.”
The Washington Post’s Fact Checker, Glenn Kessler, tweeted that the mistake was “pretty big.”
The correction is just the latest storm for a network reeling from them. It is currently dealing with unflattering stories involving sexual misconduct, secrecy, homophobia and bad decision-making, causing headaches for NBC and its news chairman, Andy Lack.
There’s the controversy over the findings of an internal review to determine who knew about disgraced “Today” host Matt Lauer’s bad behavior but didn’t report it in a timely manner; antigay slurs connected to MSNBC star Joy Reid’s blog posts; and the accusations that legendary anchor Tom Brokaw engaged in forceful and unwanted kissing of then-NBC correspondent Linda Vester in the 1990s.
Also still in play are persistent questions over why NBC sat on two major sex harassment stories: the “Access Hollywood” tape of Trump and the blockbuster reporting on alleged Hollywood sex predator Harvey Weinstein by Ronan Farrow, which won him the 2018 Pulitzer Prize for public service.
Then there’s the foundering and hugely expensive experiment with former Fox News star Megyn Kelly, who reportedly has been dragging down NBC News’ most important show by far, “Today.”
NBC has been silent on the Reid and Brokaw matters, the two most recent humiliations before the news story correction.
“If legendary icons like Matt Lauer and Tom Brokaw can be accused by apparently responsible individuals, the company should act as others have done and dispense with internal investigations and engage a high profile, independent investigator to determine the root causes as well as the specifics of these horrendous accusations,” famed reporter-turned-entrepreneur Porter Bibb previously told Fox News, adding that NBC was “seriously derelict” in not ordering an independent investigation of the entire company’s policies, protocols, and past performance.

Deep State Cartoons

Hillary Clinton says being a capitalist likely hurt her among socialist Dems

Former U.S. Secretary of State and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton speaks in Washington, Nov. 2, 2017.  (Reuters)

Hillary Clinton agreed Wednesday that being a capitalist likely damaged her 2016 campaign because nearly half of Democrats say they are socialists.
"Probably," Clinton said at the Shared Values Leadership Summit in New York City, after being asked whether support for capitalism hurt her at the polls.
"It's hard to know, but if you're in the Iowa caucuses and 41 percent of Democrats are socialists, or self-described socialists, and I'm asked, ‘Are you a capitalist?' And I say, ‘Yes, but with appropriate regulation and appropriate accountability,' you know, that probably gets lost in the ‘Oh my gosh, she's a capitalist.'"
Clinton won the Iowa caucus by a mere half-point.
The former U.S. secretary of state was challenged from the left during the Democratic primaries by self-described democratic socialist Bernie Sanders, the U.S. senator from Vermont who repeatedly criticized her for being bankrolled by Wall Street and not going after capitalism and with the same hostility as the Democratic grassroots hoped for.
During the first Democratic debate in 2015, Sanders refused to identify himself as a capitalist.
“Do I consider myself part of the casino capitalist process by which so few have so much and so many have so little?” he asked. “By which Wall Street greed and recklessness wrecked this economy? No I don’t.”
Clinton, meanwhile, offered a defense of capitalism, saying: “When I think about capitalism, I think about all the businesses that were started because we have the opportunity and the freedom to do that and to make a good living for themselves and their families … We would be making a grave mistake to turn our backs on what built the greatest middle class in the history.”
Following a short hiatus from promoting her election post-mortem book "What Happened," Clinton returned to political activities Monday, just six months before the midterm elections.
The former candidate attended a gathering of nearly a dozen progressive groups supported by Onward Together, the post-election political organization she founded that's aimed at “advancing the progressive vision that earned nearly 66 million votes in the last election.”
“I don’t want to see us go backwards,” Clinton said. “But organized interests fueled by ideology and huge amounts of money are trying to take us backwards. So I feel as strongly today as I ever have that we all have to stand up and defend our country, and most importantly, our democracy.”

Deep state has 'weaponized' security clearances against Trump, conservative Pentagon official's lawyer says

Political opponents of President Donald Trump have "weaponized" the security-clearance process against him in an undemocratic "power grab," stalling his nominations and systematically impeding White House operations, the lawyer for a top Defense Department official wrote Wednesday in the Wall Street Journal.
The charge comes less than a month after U.S. Sen. Rand Paul revealed that two romantically involved FBI officials who were removed from special counsel Robert Mueller's team over a series of anti-Trump text messages still have Top Secret security clearances.
National security attorney Sean Bigley wrote that his client, Adam Lovinger, is just one example of the ongoing war against Trump appointees. Lovinger served for more than a decade as a Pentagon strategist before being tapped to become an analyst for the National Security Council.

"Unelected partisans are quietly usurping presidential prerogatives ..."

But shortly after Lovinger turned whistleblower -- by raising concerns about the possible misuse of contractors to perform government functions -- his security clearance was suspended and he lost the NSC post, Bigley wrote.
JARED KUSHNER'S SECURITY CLEARANCE DOWNGRADED
According to Bigley, the Pentagon cited only "[s]pecious, and constantly evolving, claims of misconduct" against his client to justify the punishment. Government officials failed to provide any specific evidence for their claims, and Lovinger remains on administrative leave, the attorney wrote.
"One of Mr. Lovinger’s alleged transgressions was that Pentagon officials had improperly marked an academic report he took aboard an airplane for reading," Bigley wrote.
The root of the problem, according to Bigley, is systemic partisan bias among career government bureaucrats who have openly expressed their contempt for President Trump.
"In Mr. Lovinger’s case, those weaponizing the security-clearance process include a senior official who remains on the job despite publicly disparaging President Trump as 'unfit' to lead, a Pentagon attorney who instructed colleagues on the importance of concealing retaliatory motives behind their actions, and the Defense Department’s security adjudications chief, who persists in advancing false allegations," Bigley wrote.
"They and other unelected partisans are quietly usurping presidential prerogatives through a litany of seemingly small but slowly compounding abuses of bureaucratic power," he said.
TRUMP-HATING FBI BIGWIGS STILL HAVE TOP-SECRET SECURITY CLEARANCE
The White House's handling of security clearances came under fire earlier this year, in the wake of revelations that former White House Staff Secretary Rob Porter had worked for more than a year with only interim clearance.
Porter, whose job gave him constant access to the most sensitive of documents, had been accused of domestic abuse by his two ex-wives. The White House repeatedly adjusted its timeline about who knew what and when about the allegations.

'Mexican Mafia' crackdown results in 85 arrests in Southern California

Weapons, cash and other items seized from so-called "Mexican Mafia" suspects in "Operation Scarecrow" are seen in Orange County, Calif., May 2, 2018.  (Orange County Sheriff's Department)

A major gang crackdown aimed at so-called Mexican Mafia operations in Orange County, Calif., has led to 85 arrests of “middle management” gang leaders, officials said Wednesday.
The three-month investigation, dubbed “Operation Scarecrow,” was one of the largest operations in county history, Orange County Undersheriff Don Barnes told the Orange County Register.
Authorities confiscated 36 firearms, 14 pounds of methamphetamine and three pounds of heroin, the report said.
The investigation was also the largest crackdown on gang activity in California this year, the OC Breeze reported.
The name “Operation Scarecrow” came from its connection to a Mexican Mafia shot-caller with the street moniker “Crow,” the Register reported.
The investigation targeted the Surenos street gang and its criminal activities directed by the Mexican Mafia, the report said.
“We will continue to hold accountable those who terrorize our communities and jeopardize our public safety,” California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said, according to the Register. “All families in California deserve to know that their loved ones, especially their children, are safe.”

“We will continue to hold accountable those who terrorize our communities and jeopardize our public safety.”

The operation was a joint effort involving the California Department of Justice, the Orange County Sheriff’s Department and the California Highway Patrol, Becerra said.
“The success of this operation highlights the importance of collaborative partnerships amongst law enforcement agencies,” Sheriff Sandra Hutchens said in a statement. “The shared communication amongst our respective agencies have resulted in the removal of significant threats from our community. My hope is that these actions will send a message to criminal gangs that you are not welcome in Orange County.”
Prosecutors have filed charges in 31 cases in Orange County and two in Los Angeles, including weapon and drug violations, conspiracy, fraud and criminal street gang enhancements, the report said.
However, Barnes said the arrests were a “drop in the bucket” compared to the organization’s “mass control over street gangs statewide,” the Register reported.
“We share this information not to scare the public but to remind the residents of Orange County that this is a reality we face,” he said. “Criminal gang enterprises still continue to prey upon our community and we have to do everything we can to fight back.”

Giuliani says Trump paid $130G to Cohen for 'expenses' over several months

In a wide-ranging interview on Fox News' "Hannity" on Wednesday night, Rudy Giuliani told host Sean Hannity that President Donald Trump reimbursed his personal attorney, Michael Cohen, $130,000 that Cohen paid to adult film actress Stormy Daniels days before the 2016 election in exchange for her silence about a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006.
"That money was not campaign money," said Giuliani, a recent addition to Trump's legal team who is also a former mayor of New York City and Republican presidential candidate. "It's not campaign money. No campaign finance violation."
"They funneled the payment through [Cohen's] law firm," Hannity said.
"Funneled it through the law firm and the president repaid it," Giuliani said.
But Giuliani later clarified for Fox News that the money Trump paid to Cohen was for unspecified "expenses," and that the president was unaware that money would be going to Daniels.
A spokesman said the White House had no comment on the matter, citing an ongoing investigation.
'Over several months'
On "Hannity," Giuliani said Trump repaid Cohen "over several months" by putting him on a "retainer of $35,000 when he was doing no work for the president."
"I said, 'That's how he's repaying it, with a little profit and a little margin for paying taxes,'" said Giuliani, who added that Trump "didn’t know about the specifics of [the payment], as far as I know, but he did know about the general arrangement that Michael would take care of things like this. Like I take care of things like this for my clients. I don’t burden them with every single thing that comes along."
Last month, Trump told reporters on Air Force One that he had no knowledge about the payment Cohen made to Daniels. When asked why Cohen sent Daniels the money, the president answered: "You'll have to ask Michael Cohen - Michael's my attorney."
Days later, federal agents raided Cohen's home, office and hotel room in New York City.
After Giuliani's appearance on "Hannity," sources familiar with the matter told Fox News that Trump did in fact repay Cohen the $130,000 Cohen paid to Daniels, over several months.
While the source did not know why Trump said he had no knowledge of the payments in the Air Force One gaggle, the source confirmed that the president knowingly paid Cohen back.
The net effect of the disclosure, the source said, is that it takes any potential Federal Election Commission violation off the table as Trump paid the money from his personal funds. The argument here is that if Trump paid the money himself, there was no illegal campaign contribution.
The source said that while the matter was “embarrassing for the president, it strikes a blow to the heart of the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York’s case.
The source did not know the exact timing of when the payments to Cohen began and ended. The source believes the repayments started after the transaction with Daniels was completed.
Later Wednesday, Giuliani clarified to Fox News that the president reimbursed Cohen for "expenses," not for a payment to Daniels.
Giuliani said Cohen told the president that he had incurred the expenses on Trump’s behalf and they required repayment. The former mayor said Trump was not aware that the expenses included a $130,000 payment to Daniels.
Trump became aware of it, Giuliani said, only after the case became public.
Giuliani said the payments continued into 2017, but were completed before the Daniels non-disclosure-agreement story broke. He said he spoke with Trump before his appearance on "Hannity" and that Trump was aware of what Giuliani was going to say on the show.
Porn star's lawyer responds
Meanwhile, Michael Avenatti, attorney for Daniels, tweeted his reaction to Giuliani's "Hannity" comments.
"We predicted months ago that it would be proven that the American people had been lied to as to the $130k payment and what Mr. Trump knew, when he knew it and what he did in connection with it," Avenatti wrote. "Every American, regardless of their politics, should be outraged...
"...by what we have now learned. Mr. Trump stood on AF1 and blatantly lied. This followed the lies told by others close to him, including Mr. Cohen. This should never be acceptable in our America. We will not rest until justice is served. #basta"
"Basta," in Spanish and Italian, means "Enough!"
Later, in an appearance on "Fox News @ Night" with Shannon Bream, White House deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley said White House officials were unaware of what topics would be discussed on the "Hannity" show, and declined to comment on the $130,000 payment, citing an ongoing investigation.
"I have to refer anything on this matter to the president's outside counsel," Gidley told Bream.
Comey a 'liar'
Also in Giuliani's "Hannity" interview, Giuliani told Hannity that Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein should end Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials "in the interest of justice."
"There's been too much government misconduct," Giuliani said. "The crimes now have all been committed by the government and their agents."
The former mayor also called for former FBI Director James Comey to be prosecuted for leaking classified information, at one point calling him "a disgraceful liar."
"I have never, ever... leaked a damn thing," said Giuliani, referring to his time as a U.S. Attorney. "I would have considered resigning if I ever did that."
Comey, who was fired by Trump as FBI director in May 2017, has admitted giving memos about his conversations with President Trump to at least three people -- including members of his legal team. He has claimed that the memos were personal documents, not government property.
Giuliani said that Trump had dismissed Comey because "Comey would not, among other things, say that [Trump] wasn't a target of the [Russia] investigation. He's entitled to that. Hillary Clinton got that [during the email investigation.] And he couldn't get that.
"You can't blame the president for feeling, 'I am not being treated the same way [Clinton was]," Giuliani said.
At one point, Giuliani addressed Comey directly, saying that "every FBI agent in America has his head down because of you. It would be good ... if God had kept you out of being the head of the FBI."