Democrat Kamala Harris could lose seat on Senate Judiciary Committee, report says

Seen as a potential 2020 presidential contender, Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., garnered attention during Brett Kavanaugh's initial confirmation hearing with her intense questioning. (Associated Press)

Reducing the size of the 21-member Senate Judiciary Committee is reportedly among the actions being considered by Senate Republicans as they prepare for the next Congress.
If that happens, Sen. Kamala Harris of California -- a high-profile Democrat who is considered a possible candidate for her party’s 2020 presidential nomination -- could be left off the panel, according to a report.
That’s because the first-term senator is the judiciary committee’s most junior member, and would be among the first to go if the panel is downsized, the Washington Post reported.
But some Democrats are reportedly scrambling to find a way to keep Harris on the committee, the report said. The ideas include negotiating with Republicans -- who maintained control of the chamber after this month's midterm elections -- to keep the committee at 21 members, or convincing a more senior Democrat to step aside.
Although she has been a U.S. senator for less than two years, Harris – a former state attorney general in California – drew attention during the summer for her questioning of Brett Kavanaugh during his Supreme Court confirmation hearings.
KAMALA HARRIS COMPARES ICE TO KKK, GETS SLAMMED FOR 'DISGUSTING,' 'HORRIFYING' REMARKS
For example, Harris and Kavanaugh had a testy exchange over whether he discussed the Russia investigation being conducted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller with anyone at a law firm associated with President Trump’s personal lawyer.
“I think you’re thinking of someone and you don’t want to tell us,” Harris said when Kavanaugh responded that he couldn’t remember if he’d had such conversations.
But in September, the Washington Post gave Harris a rating of Four Pinocchios, saying she selectively edited a video of Kavanaugh comments about abortion-inducing drugs, in a bid to argue that he was against birth control.
Harris has already told Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., that she hopes to keep her Judiciary spot, her spokeswoman Lily Adams told the Post.
KAMALA HARRIS, AMID 2020 RUMORS, FLOATS $500 A MONTH TAX CREDIT
Her supporters say that Harris, 54 – by being an African-American woman – helps Democrats underscore that the GOP side of the committee includes only white males. (Harris is among four female Democrats on the panel.)
“Not only would it be unconscionable to remove the only African-American woman from the committee, but Sen. Harris also is the most skilled questioner on the entire panel,” Brian Fallon, executive director of Demand Justice, a group tries to get liberal judges appointed, told the Post. “Whatever options they need to consider, removing Harris should not be one of them. The backlash would be intense.”
But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., is said to be considering Sen.-elect Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., for a Judiciary seat, the Post reported.
Serious discussions about the future makeup of the committee will begin sometime following Tuesday’s Senate run-off election in Mississippi, the Post report said.

Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz deletes tweet suggesting 'chemical weapons' used at US-Mexico border

Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, ultimately deleted his questionable tweet about tear gas at the U.S-Mexico border. (AP, File)

Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, tweeted Sunday that the use of tear gas against Central American migrants who attempted to enter the U.S. illegally may have been a violation of international agreements governing the use of chemical weapons -- before he backtracked.
The Associated Press reported that U.S. agents shot several rounds of the gas after migrants tried to penetrate several points along the border at the San Ysidro border crossing between Tijuana, Mexico, and California. Migrants sought to squeeze through gaps in wire, climb over fences and peel back metal sheeting to enter.
In response to the reports, Schatz initially tweeted: "Tear gas across the border against unarmed families is a new low." Approximately 45 minutes later, Schatz tweeted: "Who gave the order? Did it implement or contravene policy?" He then tweeted "WHO GAVE THE ORDER?" in all caps.
Schatz then asked: "Why tear gas? Is this consistent with the Conventions on Chemical Weapons?"
However, the tweet was posted for just a few minutes before it was deleted and replaced by this message: "Anyone uncomfortable with spraying tear gas on children is welcome to join the coalition of the moral and the sane. We can argue about other stuff when we’ve got our country back."
In an exchange with opinion writer Stephen Miller, Schatz admitted that "I went ahead and deleted the one about chemical weapons because I just don’t know enough about what happened." He then asked Miller: "Does this not strike you as excessive?"
A spokesman for Schatz did not respond to Fox News' requests for comment.
Schatz, a former Hawaii state representative and lieutenant governor, was appointed to the U.S. Senate in 2012 to serve out Daniel Inouye's term after his death. Schatz was elected to his first full Senate term in 2016.

Obama Trashing America Cartoons

Chicago defends location of Obama library in federal court (500 Million Dollars could sure feed a lot of poor people in Chicago)

CHICAGO – The city of Chicago has offered its first full-throated response to a lawsuit seeking to stop construction of former President Barack Obama's museum and library.

It came in a federal court motion this week to dismiss a lawsuit by the Protect Our Parks group opposed to the Jackson Park project.

Among the city's arguments is that the site is on land never submerged under Lake Michigan and therefore not subject to restrictive public-trust laws that began developing over a century ago. The motion says the lawsuit's contention that the land was once submerged is wrong.
The official announcement that the Barack Obama Presidential Library and Museum will be located in Chicago has raised a number of questions about cost, tax dollars, how many people will come and what the heck is in those museums, anyway?
Who's paying for the library?
The Obama library, expected to cost over $500 million, is being paid for so far by private donations, though the city is giving the project 20 acres of land in either Washington or Jackson parks.
An effort by the state legislature to contribute $100 million in state funds has been shelved with Illinois facing serious debt and some Republicans objecting. However, the idea could come back, some say.
Among the private donors so far are Chicago investment banker Michael Sacks and Fred Eychaner, a local media mogul who is a frequent contributor to Democratic candidates and liberal causes. Both have donated between $501,000 and $1 million.
Once the libraries are built, they are handed over to the National Archives, which pays for operations with federal money. The facilities are staffed by federal employees and the cost is about $70 million per year for all 13 libraries, according to the Economist.

The Obama organization must, however, come up with an endowment equal to about 60 percent of the cost of constructing the library to cover operating shortfalls in the future.

As new House members descend on DC, orientation comes with its challenges

Every two years at this time, I launch into one of my favorite activities.
It’s a game called “Who is that?”
For months, I’ve poured over the pictures of Congressional candidates. I’ve read about them in news articles. Seen them in interviews. But you’re not really sure who to look for until they’re actually elected. That narrows the field. Then comes the hard part. Discerning each of the more than 90 of the new House members as they descend on Washington for freshman orientation.
As a reporter who covers Capitol Hill, you may think you’ve memorized the visages of these big freshman classes of House members just by staring for hours at pictures of them all. But you can’t truly digest who’s who until you see them in person.
The ritual starts on a street corner of a hotel a few blocks from the Capitol. This is the beginning of the freshman orientation. Reporters and cameras are squished together on a narrow swath of sidewalk. Cabs, Ubers, buses, you name it, pull up in front of the hotel and someone spills out. Then you have to figure out if that’s a freshman member….or someone else.
The best telltale sign that it’s a member-elect are the suitcases. Some come up the street pulling a handy, travel-friendly, fits-easily-in-the-over-head-compartment rolling bag. Other freshman members arrive with enough gear for the Ringling Brothers. Which is perhaps appropriate, considering the three-ring atmosphere which often dominates Capitol Hill.
Then all of the reporters spy someone and start guessing. Is that Rep.-elect Madeleine Dean, D-Pa? Rep.-elect Mark Green, R-Tenn? Rep.-elect Van Taylor, R-Texas?
There are the easy ones like Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY. But how many of you can pick out Rep.-elect Carol Miller, R-W.Va?
Sometimes all of the reporters waiting at the hotel gets thrown off. Someone comes up the street with a suitcase – and it turns out to just be someone coming up the street with a suitcase.
Four years ago at the orientation, I had never seen then-freshman Rep. French Hill, R-Ark. in my life. I pursued a man down the street for a block who I presumed to be Hill. Turns out, it was just a guy who worked at the Library of Congress.
If you are a reporter and live in the Washington, DC TV market, you have most certainly committed to memory what Reps.-elect Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., and Jennifer Wexton, D-Va., look like. Both were on the air constantly in September and October with a barrage of ads in their respective quests to topple Reps. Dave Brat, R-Va., and Barbara Comstock, R-Va. For a DC reporter, picking Spanberger and Wexton out of a crowd is like spelling “cat” in scrabble. But if you’re really good at this who’s who, you’d know Del.-elect Michael San Nicolas, D-Guam. He defeated longtime Del. Madeleine Bordallo, D-Guam, in the August primary and will become Guam’s non-voting delegate to Congress in January.
A reporter knowing San Nicolas would be like spelling “oxyphenbutzone” on the Scrabble board.
A few freshmen may not be overexposed like Ocasio-Cortez. But sharp reporters should know Rep.-elect Donna Shalala, D-Fla. She served for eight years as President Clinton’s Health and Human Services Secretary. Rep.-elect Steve Horsford, D-Nev., is also a known quantity. That’s because he served one term in Congress four years ago before losing to former Rep. Cresent Hardy, R-Nev. Rep.-elect Ed Case, D-Hawaii, is back. Case served most of two-terms in Congress, from 2003 through 2007. Rep.-elect Greg Pence, R-Ind., should be easy to spot. He looks a lot like his brother, Vice President Mike Pence. Greg Pence will represent the same district his younger brother once held in Congress.
The House Administration Committee runs the orientation. The panel always brings in a few people from races which haven’t yet been called. Rep.-elect Ben McAdams, D-Utah, is now Rep.-elect Ben McAdams, D-Utah. But a few days ago, McAdams made his way through the orientation bearing a nametag which simply read “candidate,” not Rep.-elect. McAdams had not yet vanquished Rep. Mia Love, R-Utah. But McAdams can now ditch his “candidate” nametag. He’s a Rep.-elect.
Also, the House swore-in three freshman who simultaneously won election to the 119th Congress – but also special elections to fulfil the remainder of unexpired terms. The House greeted Reps. Mary Gay Scanlon, D-Pa., Kevin Hern, R-Okla., and Joseph Morelle, D-NY, for orientation and swore them in as a part of the present Congress. They succeed former Reps. Patrick Meehan, R-Pa., Jim Bridenstine, R-Okla. - who is now the NASA Administrator - and the late Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-NY.
Up at the hotel, the best tactic to meet some of the freshman members is to not get caught up in the press pen. Let the rest of the press corps work the “line of scrimmage.” Instead, I sometimes hang back about a block away, playing “free safety.” That’s where I encountered Reps.-elect Lori Trahan, D-Mass., Kendra Horn, D-Okla., and Tim Burchett, R-Tenn.
Inevitably, reporters will misidentify the new members. Part of that is just because there’s such a big class and it’s hard to keep track of everyone. A few reporters followed Rep.-elect Deb Haaland, D-N.M. up the street, mistaking her for Rep.-elect Sharice Davids, D-Kansas.
If you are a reporter and trying to put a name with a face on all of the newcomers, keep your eyes open as you walk around the Capitol. That’s where I saw Reps.-elect Antonio Delgado, D-NY, Jeff Van Drew, D-N.J., Greg Steube, R-Fla., and Steve Watkins, R-Okla. I was about to leave the Capitol one night when I came across Rep.-elect Colin Allred, D-Texas, trying to locate a room near the Speaker’s Lobby.
Over the past two weeks, reporters have assembled various “facebooks” and other pictoriol aides to help them get to know the freshman class. For the record, we used to just call these primers “facebooks” until Facebook came on the scene. I will spend part of of my Thanksgiving, and, inevitably Christmas holidays, sitting in cars, lounges at airports, and on airplanes, studying the names and faces of all the new members.
But frankly, it’s hard to really know them all until you see them in person.
A good example of this came in 2014. One of the “facebooks” put pictures of then incoming Reps. Mike Bost, R-Ill., Rod Blum, R-Iowa, David Young, R-Iowa, and Bruce Poliquin, R-Maine, together. They all have glasses and similar hair. But until you see them in person, you would never know that Young is stocky. Blum is tall (and always wears a pocket square). Poliquin is short.
For the record, of those four, only Bost survived the 2018 midterm.
And that’s why it’s time to learn a whole new class of people for the 116th Congress.

Kamala Harris, Cory Booker ‘basic income’ plans likely remove work incentive, think tank says

Sen. Kamala Harris is proposing a new tax credit. Sen. Cory Booker proposes "opportunity accounts." (Associated Press)

Two Democrats in the U.S. Senate – both said to be eyeing the party’s 2020 presidential nomination -- recently announced so-called “basic income” plans for America’s lower-income families. A liberal publication, meanwhile, says neither plan goes far enough to aid families, and the government should instead just start “writing them checks.”
But the Heritage Foundation argues that such plans tend to fail, in part because they tend to remove the incentive for work.
In October, Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., unveiled her LIFT the Middle Class Act. It would provide a tax credit of up to $6,000 a year to families earning less than $100,000 a year, and a credit of up to $3,000 for those earning less than $50,000 a year, the Washington Times reported.
“Middle class families deserve to know that one unexpected cost won’t lead to a financial emergency,” Harris tweeted last month, when the plan was unveiled. “The LIFT the Middle Class Act that I introduced would help address the rising costs of housing, tuition, childcare, and more.”
But the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimated earlier this month that Harris’s plan would add $2.8 trillion to the federal deficit over its first decade and another $3.4 billion over its second decade, the Washington Post reported.
Harris proposed paying for her plan by canceling parts of the Republican Party’s tax cuts and charging a new tax on banks and other financial institutions, the report said.
Meanwhile, Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., proposed last month the creation of “opportunity accounts” for the nation’s children, which could grow to about $46,000 per child by the time they turn 18, Business Insider reported.
“Today, nearly one in three American families have zero to negative wealth, and it’s hard to get ahead if you begin life behind the starting line,” Booker said of the plan, the Washington Times reported.
Watchdog.org estimated that Booker’s plan would cost American taxpayers at least $60 billion annually.
But liberal publication the Nation claims that both wealth distribution plans fall short.
“Harris’s plan suffers from two problems,” author Bryce Covert writes in the publication. “The first is who she leaves out. By matching only the income that poor families earn from work, it omits those who don’t earn anything.”

“Harris’s plan suffers from two problems. The first is who she leaves out. By matching only the income that poor families earn from work, it omits those who don’t earn anything.”
— Bryce Covert, writing in the Nation

The second problem with Harris’s plan, he writes, “is that she still relies on giving money to families through the tax code, an opaque and complicated way of doing it.”
Covert then hails Booker’s plan for “sending money straight to the people who need it,” but says it “mistimes the assistance,” providing it when youths reach adulthood, “when most families are more economically stable.”
He suggests instead that both plans be set aside in favor of Russell Sage Foundation researchers’ suggestion that parents be sent “at least $250 a month for each child,” a plan estimated to cost U.S. taxpayers $190 billion per year.
“That’s still less than what’s been estimated for Harris’s plan,” Covert writes, “and less than the recent Republican tax cuts are likely to cost over the next three years.”
But the Heritage Foundation’s Vijay Menon wrote last month that plans similar to the recent liberal proposals have been tried before – only to fail.
Menon writes that a “negative income tax” experiment ran in six states from 1968 to 1980, and was documented by libertarian writer Charles Murray, author of “Losing Ground.”
“In ‘Losing Ground,’” Menon writes, “Murray concluded that the effect of the negative income tax on reducing work was ‘unambiguous and strong.’ ”
“If recipients lost their jobs during the experiment,” Menon notes, “they experienced significantly longer spells of unemployment compared with non-recipients — more than two months longer for husbands, almost a year longer for wives, and longer still for single mothers.”
In summary, Menon writes, such plans are “a misguided approach.”
“Policy should be designed to reward work, rather than replace it,” Menon writes. Therefore, a better alternative to a universal basic income would be to expand the earned income tax credit.”

US leading the charge in pushing back against UN’s migration agenda

Under the Trump administration, the U.S. is leading the charge in pushing back against the U.N.’s migration agenda -- a move that is picking up support from other countries and giving political cover to those seeking to join them.
The Trump administration announced last December that it would withdraw from the U.N.'s Global Migration Compact -- due to be adopted by an intergovernmental conference in Morocco next month. Then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson argued last year that the compact could undermine America's right to enforce its immigration laws and secure its borders.
“The United States supports international cooperation on migration issues, but it is the primary responsibility of sovereign states to help ensure that migration is safe, orderly, and legal,” Tillerson said.
The U.S. was the first country to withdraw, but it was soon followed by a stream of other countries pulling out of the non-binding compact, officially called the “Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration.” Hungary, Poland, Austria, Australia and Israel have all since announced they will not sign the accord, citing concerns that it will limit the ability of countries to set and enforce their own immigration policies.
“We are committed to guarding our borders against illegal migrants,” Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said this week. “This is what we have done and this is what we will continue to do."
"We believe that the Compact is inconsistent with our well-established policies and not in Australia’s interest," Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said in a statement this week. "The Compact fails to adequately distinguish between people who enter Australia illegally and those who come to Australia the right way, particularly with respect to the provision of welfare and other benefits."
U.N. General Assembly President Maria Espinosa on Wednesday defended the compact and said it also gave countries flexibility to shape their own migration policies.
“The Compact allows enormous flexibility for countries to use the parts of the compact that can be adapted to their sovereign decisions and existing legal frameworks…it is a cooperation instrument,” she said at a press conference this week.
The accord consists of 23 objectives for managing migration at "local, national, regional and global levels." But many of those aims are vague, including objectives like: "enhance availability and flexibility of pathways for regular migration" and "address and reduce vulnerabilities in migration."

James Jay Carafano, a national security analyst at the Heritage Foundation, told Fox News that the U.S. is right to be skeptical of global compacts that may seek to establish broad global norms, like a right to migrate, in part because they can encourage further dangerous migration and international instability.
“I think it’s actually a courageous act of American leadership where America is not just looking out for itself for but the world as a whole,” he said.

Carafano pointed to the recent migrant caravan moving through Honduras and Guatemala, and through Mexico toward the U.S., which the Trump administration has been eager to block from entering the U.S., and also forced migrations out of countries such as Syria and Libya.
“Now people want to create a right for anyone to have a right to global migration, which could create all kinds of problems,” he said.
Just as back in Washington, President Trump is calling for action against the incoming migrant caravan, at the U.N, the U.S. is expressing concern about the direction of a separate global compact -- this time on refugees, over fears it too could infringe on a government’s sovereignty to control its own borders.
“The United States believes it is the primary responsibility of sovereign states to ensure that migration is managed consistent with each nation’s domestic laws and policies, and its international obligations,” a U.S. official told Fox News. “A government’s first duty is to its citizens – to serve their needs, to ensure their safety, to preserve their rights, and to defend their values.”
The U.S. last week voted against an annual draft U.N. General Assembly resolution on the U.N.’s refugee agency (UNHCR), saying that while it supports the UNHCR and “much of what is contained” in the Global Compact on Refugees, it also has concerns that need to be addressed.
Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) U.S. Ambassador Kelley Currie told the body that the resolution contained elements “that run directly counter to my government’s sovereign interests.” Specifically she pointed to a number of paragraphs, including one that spoke of the “need” to limit the detention of asylum seekers.
“We will detain and prosecute those who enter U.S. territory illegally, consistent with our domestic immigration laws and our international interests,” she said.
Currie also said the U.S. “cannot accept” language that “affirms” the compact and “calls upon” states to implement the refugee compact. Currie said that it is the U.S.’ understanding that the compact is non-binding and none of the compact’s provisions “create or affect rights or obligations of states under international law, or otherwise change the current state of conventional or customary international law.”
UNHCR says that the compact "aims to strengthen the international response to large movements of refugees and protracted refugee situations" by objectives such as enhancing refugee self-reliance, easing pressure on host countries, and supporting condition in countries of origin for return.
Brett Schaefer, a U.N. expert at the Heritage Foundation, said that the approach from the U.S. is expressing widely-held fears that non-binding compacts are a step toward creating additional norms and eventually a binding one-size-fits-all global agreement down the line.
“Every country has to deal with these complex political issues as best fits them and having a top-down, one-size-fits-all, U.N.-led process might not be appropriate for all countries and that's the case for United States,” he told Fox News.
This attitude was demonstrated clearly by President Trump, when he spoke to the U.N. General Assembly in September and made the U.S. commitment to control over its borders clear -- and justified the U.S.’s withdrawal from the migration compact.
“We recognize the right of every nation in this room to set its own immigration policy in accordance with its national interests, just as we ask other countries to respect our own right to do the same — which we are doing,” he said.
“Migration should not be governed by an international body unaccountable to our own citizens,” he added.

Nancy Pelosi & Chuck Schumer Cartoons