Hume criticizes 'inappropriate' behavior by reporters who helped Harris shop

Fox News senior political analyst Brit Hume criticized a group of reporters who encouraged Sen. Kamala Harris to try on clothes during a campaign stop last week inside a South Carolina boutique.
“It is totally and obviously outwardly inappropriate for members of the media to come across and start recommending what the candidates should wear,” Hume told Tucker Carlson during a Tuesday appearance on Fox News' “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”
“Wait a second, wait, hold on. You were ABC News’s White House correspondent for 8 years. You never bought clothing for Ronald Reagan?” Carlson jokingly replied.
"I didn’t because I was covering (George H.W.) Bush and later (Bill) Clinton, and I never recommended clothing to either one of them," Hume said. "This kind of chummy, let's go shopping stuff is obviously something inappropriate."
Hume called the reporters behavior "embarrassing" in a tweet following the encounter.
"So now journalists are going shopping with Harris, helping pick out clothes and then putting out glowing tweets about it," he wrote.
The reporters - CNN national political reporter Maeve Reston; NBC News political reporter Ali Vitali and CBS News political reporter Caitlin Huey-Burns – joked about the incident on social media but have received criticism from some within the news industry for crossing an ethical line.
Journalists typically interact with candidates while on the campaign trail, but recommending outfits can be considered a breach of journalistic integrity.

Trump WH 'exploring every legal option' to reclaim money from defunct California high-speed rail project

The Trump administration announced on Tuesday that it is exploring "every legal option" to reclaim $2.5 billion in federal funds spent by California on its now-defunct high-speed rail project, and also that it intends to cancel $928 million in federal grants not yet paid for the project to link Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area.
The move was a dramatic escalation in the ongoing war of words and policy between California and the White House. California Gov. Gavin Newsom,a Democrat, declared during his State of the State address last week that he was shelving plans for the $77 billion rail project that had been championed by environmental groups, admitting that "as currently planned, [it] would cost too much and take too long."
In response to the Trump administration's legal threat Tuesday, Newsom vowed that he would not sit "idly by" as the White House engaged in what he called "political retribution" against California.
In a letter, the U.S. Department of Transportation and Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) Administrator Ronald Batory said Newsom's State of the State address constituted a "significant retreat from the State's initial vision and commitment and frustrates the purpose for which federal funding was awarded (i.e., an initial investment in the larger high-speed rail system.)"

This December 2017 file photo shows one of the elevated sections of the high-speed rail under construction in Fresno, Calif. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)

Batory, writing to the California HSR Authority (CHSRA), also charged that the state had "materially failed to comply" with its agreement to contribute substantial matching funding to the project in recent months.
For example, Batory noted, California pledged to spend $141.8 million to "advance final design and construction activities" on the high-speed rail network in December 2018 but ended up recording only $47.9 million in expenditures.
INGRAHAM: CALIFORNIA'S PLAN WAS A JOKE FROM THE START -- A LITERAL HIGH-SPEED TRAIN TO NOWHERESVILLE
Additionally, the letter pointed out that the project would not have been completed by 2022, when the state agreed to complete the work.
The agreement's termination is set to take effect March 5, although Batory offered California officials an opportunity to dispute the government's findings.

FILE - In this Feb. 26, 2015, file photo, a full-scale mock-up of a high-speed train is displayed at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif. The Trump administration plans to cancel $929 million in U.S. money for California's beleaguered high-speed rail project and wants the state to return an additional $2.5 billion it's already spent. The U.S. Department of Transportation announcement Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2019, came after President Donald Trump last week threatened to make California pay back the money awarded to build the train between Los Angeles and San Francisco. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)

The high-speed rail has been seen as a beleaguered and problematic project for years. According to a timeline created by Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), California voters in 2008 "first approved $9.95 billion in bonds for a first in the nation, 800-mile high-speed rail project with an initial cost estimate of $35 billion, to be completed by 2020."
By 2014, no construction had started, but in his State of the State address, then-Gov. Jerry Brown, a Democrat, “ad-libbed [a] summary of the Little Engine That Could, rhythmically chanting its signature line, ‘I think I can,’ four times.”
In 2017, the Orange County Register wrote that the project was "more time-consuming and tens of billions of dollars more expensive than estimated when California voters approved the funding measure in 2008.”
Finally, Newsom announced this month, “Let's be real. The current project, as planned, would cost too much and respectfully take too long. There's been too little oversight and not enough transparency.”
Republican lawmakers in the Golden State responded to Newsom's pullout from the project last week by calling for a referendum vote on Newsom’s plan to build a much shorter, 171-mile railway through the state’s Central Valley.
The constant delays and overspending has made California Democrats a prime target for the White House. On Tuesday, Trump mocked California for joining 15 other states in suing the administration over its recent emergency declaration -- and added a jab about the rail project. (The $77 billion project would dwarf the cost of a wall at the border -- estimated to be $20-25 billion.)

FILE: Feb. 13, 2013: A computer render of California's proposed high-speed train. (CHSRA)

"As I predicted, 16 states, led mostly by Open Border Democrats and the Radical Left, have filed a lawsuit in, of course, the 9th Circuit! California, the state that has wasted billions of dollars on their out of control Fast Train, with no hope of completion, seems in charge!" he tweeted.
The president added: "The failed Fast Train project in California, where the cost overruns are becoming world record setting, is hundreds of times more expensive than the desperately needed Wall!"
Last week, Trump and Newsom publicly sparred over the governor's sudden withdrawal from the pact to build the rail network.
In a tweet, Trump wrote: “California has been forced to cancel the massive bullet train project after having spent and wasted many billions of dollars. They owe the Federal Government three and a half billion dollars. We want that money back now. Whole project is a ‘green’ disaster!”
Newsom shot back 40 minutes later.
“Fake news," Newsom wrote. "We’re building high-speed rail, connecting the Central Valley and beyond. This is CA’s money, allocated by Congress for this project. We’re not giving it back. The train is leaving the station — better get on board! (Also, desperately searching for some wall $$??)”
In a statement, CAGW President Tom Schatz said there were larger lessons to be learned from the debacle.
“California’s high-speed rail fantasy quickly became a train to nowhere at taxpayer expense," Schatz said. "This failed boondoggle should be taken as a giant red stop sign for any politician who supports the ‘Green New Deal’ and its equally farcical promise of ending air travel by forcing taxpayers to pay for a California-style rail system across the entire nation.”

Covington High student's legal team sues Washington Post

Attorneys representing the Kentucky high school student involved in a confrontation that went viral on social media last month announced Tuesday that they were suing The Washington Post for $250 million in compensatory and punitive damages.
The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in Kentucky, accused The Post of practicing "a modern-day form of McCarthyism" by targeting Nicholas Sandmann and "using its vast financial resources to enter the bully pulpit by publishing a series of false and defamatory print and online articles ... to smear a young boy who was in its view an acceptable casualty in their war against the president."
Washington Post spokesperson Kris Coratti told Fox News in an email that the paper was "reviewing a copy of the lawsuit, and we plan to mount a vigorous defense."
Sandmann, a junior at Covington Catholic High School, became a target for outrage after a video of him standing face-to-face with a Native American man, Nathan Phillips, while wearing a red "Make America Great Again" hat surfaced in January. Sandmann was one of a group of students from Covington attending the anti-abortion March for Life in Washington, D.C., while Phillips was attending the Indigenous Peoples' March on the same day.
Sandmann and the Covington students were initially accused of initiating the confrontation, but other videos and the students' own statements showed that they were verbally accosted by a group of black street preachers who were shouting insults both at them and a group of Native Americans. Sandmann and Phillips have both said they were trying to defuse the situation.
The lawsuit claims The Post "ignored the truth" about the incident and says the paper "falsely accused Nicholas of ... 'accost[ing]' Phillips by 'suddenly swarm[ing]' him in a 'threaten[ing]' and 'physically intimidat[ing]' manner ... 'block[ing]' Phillips path, refusing to allow Phillips 'to retreat,' 'taunting the dispersing indigenous crowd,' [and] chanting, 'Build that wall,' 'Trump2020,' or 'Go back to Africa,' and otherwise engaging in racist and improper conduct. ..."Sandmann's attorneys accuse The Post of publishing seven "false and defamatory" articles about the incident between Jan. 19 and 21 and claim the paper "knew and intended that its false and defamatory accusations would be republished by others, including media outlets and others on social media."
Earlier this month, Sandmann's attorneys sent preservation letters to more than 50 media organizations, celebrities and politicians -- including The Post, The New York Times, CNN, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and actors Alyssa Milano and Jim Carrey -- the first step in possible libel and defamation lawsuits.
Last week, investigators hired by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Covington concluded that the students did not instigate the confrontation with Phillips. Bishop Roger Foys, who initially condemned the students' behavior, wrote in a letter to parents that they had been "placed in a situation that was at once bizarre and even threatening."

California Democrat Cartoons

Sen. Amy Klobuchar is a 'no' on free college tuition

U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., speaks during a meet and greet with local residents, Saturday, Feb. 16, 2019, in Mason City, Iowa. AP

Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn, has separated herself again from the large field of progressive 2020 candidates by not endorsing free college tuition.
At a televised town hall in Manchester, N.H, a recent college graduate asked the senator about her thoughts on the student debt crisis.
"Would you be willing to stand with my generation and end the student debt crisis by free college for all and would you include undocumented and formerly-incarcerated people in that program?" he asked, adding that he wanted a “clear yes or no” answer.
Klobuchar said she wants to “make it easier to refinance” and extend Pell Grants to include more students. She also called on two-year community college to be free. She said she'd like to focus on kids that don't graduate high school.
CNN anchor Don Lemon pressed Klobuchar to answer yes or no.
“No, I am not for free college for all,” Klobuchar answered. “I wish if I was a magic genie and could give that to everyone and we could afford it, I would.  I’m just trying to find a mix of incentives and make sure kids are in need- and that’s why I talked about expanding Pell Grants, can go to college and be able to afford it and make sure that people who can’t afford it are able to pay.”
This isn’t the first time Klobuchar has distanced herself from her liberal peers. She is one of very few Democrats who hasn’t endorsed the Green New Deal, calling the resolution an “aspiration” but that the goals are “very difficult” to meet in such a short period of time.

Trump declares 'socialism is dying' amid Venezuela 'catastrophe,' promises 'this will never happen to us'

President Donald Trump, speaking in a major foreign policy address in Miami to members of the Venezuelan community, declared Monday that "a new day is coming in Latin America" and issued a stark assessment that "socialism is dying" across the world.
In a wide-ranging rebuke of socialism that seemed targeted as much at Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua as it was at congressional Democrats, Trump remarked: "We know that socialism is not about justice, it's not about equality, it's not about lifting up the poor -- it's about one thing only: power for the ruling class. And, the more power they get, the more they crave. They want to run health care, run transportation and finance, run energy, education, run everything. They want the power to decide who wins and who loses, who's up and who's down, what's true and what's false, and even who lives and who dies."
Before a supportive and raucous crowd at Florida International University in Miami Trump announced, flanked by large American and Venezuelan flags, "This will never happen to us. ... To those who would try to impose socialism on the United States, we again deliver a very simple message: America will never be a socialist country."
The president's vow came as Democrats have proposed an evolving agenda of "Medicare-for-all," free college tuition, minimum wage increases and even guaranteed basic income.
"When Venezuela is free, and Cuba is free, and Nicaragua is free, this will become the first free hemisphere in all of human history," Trump said.
The address was the second time Trump publicly and forcefully has condemned what he has called "the horrors of socialism and communism" and "massive wealth confiscation" in recent weeks, following his similar vow during the State of the Union address that "America will never be a socialist country."
That remark, which left Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., stone-faced, came as part of a larger condemnation of disputed President Nicolas Maduro for "turning that nation from being the wealthiest in South America into a state of abject poverty and despair" through a mixture of "brutality" and "socialist policies."

Venezuelan boys holding cups of a grape-flavored drink, part of the free lunch that is given out daily at the "Divina Providencia" migrant shelter in La Parada, near Cucuta, Colombia, on the border with Venezuela, on Monday. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)

On Monday, Trump hammered that theme repeatedly and called on Venezuela's military to rise up and take on Maduro, who has blocked U.S. humanitarian aid shipments.
"We know the truth about socialism in Venzuela, in Cuba, in Nicaragua, and all around the world. Socialism promises prosperity, but it delivers poverty," Trump said. "Socialism promises unity, but it delivers hatred and it delivers division. Socialism promises a better future, but it always returns to the darkest chapters of the past. That never fails. It always happens. Socialism is a sad and discredited ideology rooted in a total ignorance of history and human nature, which is why socialism, eventually, must always give rise to tyranny -- which it does. Socialists profess a love of diversity, but they always insist on absolute conformity."
DEMS SIT EXPRESSIONLESS AS TRUMP DECLARES SOCIALISM WILL NEVER COME TO THE U.S.
As the crowd chanted "USA," Trump, who was joined by first lady Melania Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and National Security Adviser John Bolton, asserted, "The people of Venezuela stand at the threshold of history -- ready to reclaim their country and to reclaim their future. Not long ago, Venezuela was the wealthiest nation by far in South America. But, years of socialist rule have brought this once-thriving nation to the brink of ruin.
"The results have been catastrophic," Trump continued. "Almost 90 percent of Venezuelans now live in poverty. In 2018, hyperinflation in Venezuela exceeded one million percent. Crippling shortages of food and medicine plague the country. Socialism has so completely ravaged this great country that even the world's largest reserves of oil are no longer enough to keep the lights on."
As the monthslong political crisis in Venezuela continued, Trump took multiple generalized shots at socialism that pointedly were not limited to the country's borders.

"America will never be a socialist country."
— President Trump

"The days of socialism and communism are numbered not only in Venezuela, but in Nicaragua and Cuba as well," Trump said, as the crowd roared. "Do we love Cuba? Do we love Nicaragua? Great countries. Great potential."
Trump again declared that Guaido was the country's rightful president amid what he called an unprecedented "humanitarian disaster." He also made a public case to Venezuela's military, which has remained loyala to Maduro and could play a decisive role in the stalemate, to support Guaido's government.
Trump issued a dire warning to Venezuela's military that if they continue to stand with Maduro, "you will find no safe harbor, no easy exit and no way out. You will lose everything."
Trump added: "We seek a peaceful transition of power, but all options are open."
Trump urged the Venezuelan military to accept Guaido's offer of amnesty and refrain from violence against those opposing Maduro's government. And he praised the Venezuelan opposition, saying of the people of Venezuela, "They are turning the page on dictatorship and there will be no going back."

Free lunches prepped with lentils, a slice of bologna, rice and a piece of plantain ready to be served at a migrant shelter in La Parada, near Cucuta, Colombia, on the border with Venezuela, Monday. (AP Photo/Fernando Vergara)

The Maduro-controlled military has blocked the U.S. from moving tons of humanitarian aid airlifted in recent days to the Colombian border with Venezuela. The aid shipments have been meant in part to emphasize the hyperinflation and shortages of food and medicine that are gripping Venezuela.
"Unfortunately, Dictator Maduro has blocked this life-saving aid from entering the country. He would rather see his people starve than give them aid, than help them," Trump said. "Millions of Venezuelans are starving and suffering while a small handful at the top of the Maduro regime plunder the regime into poverty and death. We know who they are and we know where they keep the billions of dollars they have stolen."
The aid is supposed to be moved into Venezuela on Feb. 23 by supporters of Guaido. But, Maduro has called the aid unnecessary and said it constituted an attempt to destabilize his government.
Trump delivered the remarks to a supportive audience at Florida International University in Miami. South Florida is home to more than 100,000 Venezuelans and Venezuelan-Americans, the largest concentration in the country. Trump has largely been spending the holiday weekend at his private club in West Palm Beach.

Juan Guaido speaking during an economic forum in Caracas last week. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Critics said Maduro's re-election last year was fraudulent, making his second term illegal.
On Sunday, Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio -- whom Trump invoked in his Monday address -- visited a border staging point for U.S. aid to Venezuela and warned soldiers loyal to Maduro that it would be a "crime against humanity" if they blocked entry of the goods being channeled through Maduro's rivals.
An enthusiastic throng of Venezuelan migrants, some chanting "Rubio! Liberty," met the senator as he visited Cucuta and held a news conference in sight of a border bridge that has been flooded in recent months by people escaping the hardships of Venezuela's hyperinflation and severe shortages of food and medicine.
While Russia, China, Turkey and a large number of Asian and African countries still back Maduro, Rubio dismissed them, saying in English: "The countries that support Maduro do not surprise us. All of them are corrupt and none of them is a democracy and many of them are owed billions of dollars that they want to get paid by the corrupt regime."

Warren set to release $70B-per-year plan for universal child care, will tap wealth tax

It's all about tax, tax, tax!

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., acknowledges cheers as she takes the stage during an event to formally launch her presidential campaign. (AP)

Elizabeth Warren, the Democratic senator from Massachusetts, is expected to announce a plan Tuesday that would fund universal child care by tapping into revenue from her wealth tax proposal, reports said.
The broad strokes of the plan-- which would cover 12 million children-- would mean no family would have to spend more than seven percent of its total household income, according to The Huffington Post, which first reported on the announcement. The report said the number is based off a Department of Health and Human Services figure on what qualifies as affordable child care.
The plan is still being worked on, but sources told the news outlet that they expect it to cost about $700 billion in new funding over 10 years, or four times what the federal government pays on these programs.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the average family pays $7,200 a year on child care.
The Massachusetts Democrat, a 2020 presidential candidate, would use part of the revenue from her proposed tax on the ultra-wealthy to fund the plan. Her plan calls for a two percent tax on household wealth above $50 million and an additional one percent on those above $1 billion.
Warren’s plan would set up a federal program to guarantee child care from birth until children’s entry into school. Families with income less than 200 percent of the poverty line would get free access.
Her plan would guarantee compensation for child care program workers at rates comparable to public school teachers in their areas.

Venezuelan who escaped socialist nightmare slams Green New Deal

A Venezuelan citizen who left the crisis-stricken country in his teens for America is speaking out against socialism and the Maduro regime -- and giving a warning to anyone who may support the Green New Deal backed by liberal Democrats including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.
Daniel Di Martino, a college student who grew up in Venezuela before his family left the socialist country when he was 16, said Monday on “The Story with Martha MacCallum” that his family went from flourishing in the upper middle class to making just two dollars a day under now-disputed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and former President Hugo Chavez.
“By the time I left Venezuela in 2016 we had a blackout every week -- and I was privileged,” Di Martino told Martha MacCallum.
He said he saw parallels between what he experienced in Venezuela and the rise of socialism in America. “I hear what I heard from the socialist regime in Venezuela, ‘everything is alright.’”
He continued, “People are starving in Venezuela because policies such as the one that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez [supported] in her Green New Deal, which in reality is just the ‘red new deal’ which is just a socialist wish list, would destroy the U.S. economy and lead us into the path of Venezuela.”
President Trump on Monday spoke in Miami in front of a crowd comprised mostly of Venezuelan and Cuban Americans and asked military officials loyal to Maduro to abandon him and accept opposition leader Juan Guaido as the country's new president.
"We seek a peaceful transition of power, but all options are open," Trump said.
Di Martino outlined his family's struggles in Venezuela in a USA Today op-ed.
“I watched what was once one of the richest countries in Latin America gradually fall apart under the weight of big government,” Di Martino wrote.