Bernie Sanders visibly frustrated as hecklers unload at She The People Forum for women of color

2020 presidential contender Bernie Sanders faced an aggressive and, at times, outwardly combative audience at the She The People Forum devoted to women of color in Houston on Wednesday, as the self-described democratic socialist struggled to convince attendees of his commitment to minority and underprivileged communities.
The tense moments underscored the challenges Sanders' campaign still faces despite its frontrunner status. The 77-year-old Vermont senator, long a champion for progressive causes, has sought to win over voters who turned out in massive numbers to support former President Barack Obama.
In a particularly striking moment, host Aimee Allison asked Sanders what he would do to fight white-supremacist violence. In response, Sanders launched into a familiar anecdote that -- perhaps precisely because of its familiarity -- seemed to crash and burn.
"I know I date myself a little bit here, but I actually was at the March on Washington with Dr. [Martin Luther] King back in 1963," Sanders began, as audible groans and jeers broke out at the auditorium at Texas Southern University. One person apparently shouted, "We know!"
"And," Sanders continued, as he held his hand up to quiet the crowd and apparently to wag his finger, "as somebody who actively supported Jesse Jackson's campaign, as one of the few white elected officials to do so in '88, I have dedicated my life to the fight against racism, and sexism, and discrimination of all forms."
Sanders faced similar backlash when he responded to an audience question about white supremacy by discussing immigration and the federal minimum wage, as well as his sweeping "Medicare for All" proposal. The audience loudly applauded when Allison reminded Sanders that the "core of the question" concerned violence against minorities.
Separately, co-host Joy Reid asked Sanders how he would win over Hillary Clinton voters, including black women in particular. In response, Sanders trashed Trump as "the most dangerous president" in modern history, and generally called for unity among Democrats as well as "social justice, racial justice, and environmental justice."
That response immediately drew more hecklers, as Reid pressed, "Yeah, and for black women specifically?"
"I'm sorry?" Sanders asked, as the jeers became louder. "For black women specifically," Reid reiterated.
Sanders responded: "Black women will be an integral part of what our campaign, and what our administration is about. Okay? And that means --"
The audience erupted with heckling for a few seconds, as Sanders tossed his arm up in the air in dismay and muttered, "Okay."
"Were you finished with your --," Allison asked when the crowd quieted.
"Yeah," Sanders replied.
Seven other 2020 Democrats spoke at the first-ever She The People forum on Wednesday, including Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Beto O'Rourke, Julian Castro, Tulsi Gabbard and Amy Klobuchar.
Some used the event to make news and largely avoided audience attacks. Booker, for example, definitively declared that his running mate will be a woman.
But, the road was rocky for others. Gabbard, a Hawaii congresswoman, also faced some heat from the crowd during her own remarks.
"There are a lot of bad people in the world," Gabbard began at one point.
Then came the reply from a heckler: "You’re one of them!”
Fox News' Paulina Dedaj contributed to this report.

Swalwell refuses to answer Trump 'Russian asset' question despite Mueller report

Rep. Eric Swalwell, D-Calif., on Wednesday refused to acknowledge that the Mueller Report failed to establish evidence of a criminal conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russia and appeared to double down on his claims that President Trump puts Russia's interest before the U.S.
Swalwell has been one of Trump's most vocal Democratic critics and has announced his bid for the 2020 presidential election.
MSNBC host Ari Melber challenged Swalwell during his appearance.
“Do you accept the findings in the Mueller report that do not support some of those claims?” Melber asked Swalwell.
“I accept that I probably should have been out there a little bit earlier because who knew how many links there were? 200 pages of links," Swalwell said. Melber pressed him again, asking if he no longer maintained that Trump is a “Russian asset.”
“No, I think he acts on Russia’s behalf and I challenge him to show me otherwise,” Swalwell said.
The host asked him one more time about the distance between his allegations of conspiracy and the findings in the Mueller report. Swalwell replied that he believes Trump puts Russia’s "interests ahead of our interests," citing "Assad in Syria, he wants to reduce the role of NATO, he continues to pull back sanctions on Russia, he won't tell us what he talked about with Vladimir Putin and he won't tell us anything about his finances with the Russians."
Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report released late last month revealed Mueller did not establish evidence that the Trump campaign had conspired with Russia.
Swalwell has long been a critic of the president and even documented his determination to not buy coffee at Trump Tower on Twitter in February.
Trump has railed against Mueller’s report, even resorting to public profanity in dismissing it, but has also embraced it, claiming exoneration and painting any other attempt as partisan overreach.
“You want to see the nonpartisan, definitive, conclusive taxpayer-funded lengthy unobstructed, unimpeded, un-interfered with investigation? You just saw it and it’s called the Mueller report,” senior counselor Kellyanne Conway said Wednesday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report

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2020 Dems a 'blob of socialists,' Trump's communications director tells Todd Starnes

Todd Starnes speaks with Marc Lotter, director of strategic communications for the Trump 2020 campaign, about how the Democrats fared during their most recent televised town halls.

The Democratic Party's 2020 presidential field is a “blob of socialists,” and they're making the party too “extreme,” the director of strategic communications for President Trump's re-election campaign said Tuesday.
Marc Lotter made the comments during an appearance on “The Todd Starnes Show.”
“What we're talking about right now is just a giant blob of socialists," Lotter told host Todd Starnes, "and they're trying to compete with each other to see who can be the most radical, the most out of step, offer the most free things that no one knows how to pay for.
“And whichever one of those 21, or 30 -- whatever it's going to end up being -- candidates that emerges from their primary is going to be broke, broken, battered," Lotter continued, "and inherit the keys to a Democrat National Committee that is broke, still taking on millions of dollars and that has no appreciable national program in place and they're going to be competing against a president who's getting results.”
Former Vice President Joe Biden is expected to enter the Democratic field this week, making him the 20th candidate seeking the Democratic Party's 2020 presidential nomination.
Lotter touted the U.S. economy's performance under President Trump and also mocked Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., for his appearance on a CNN Town Hall event Monday, where Sanders said felons should be permitted to vote, including the Boston Marathon bomber.
“The Democrat field last night out there talking about the Boston Marathon bomber voting from prison -- a terrorist who killed Americans, allowing that person to vote --- it’s a perfect example of how radical and extreme the Democrat socialist party has become,” Lotter said.

New York's MTA top earner made $344G in overtime last year: report

Andy Byford arrives at the Bowling Green Station to begin his first day as MTA New York City Transit President on Tue., January 16, 2018. Byford was only the 21st-highest earner in the MTA last year. (Marc A. Hermann / MTA New York City Transit)

Riders get slapped with fare hikes — while these guys ride the gravy train.
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s top earner last year raked in a budget-busting $344,147 in overtime — on top of his $117,499 salary, according to data released Tuesday by the Empire Center fiscal-watchdog group.
While delays on the Long Island Rail Road hit a 19-year high in 2018, chief measurement operator Thomas Caputo brought home a fat $461,646 paycheck — more than anyone else at the agency, and $164,027 more than he earned the year before.
And yet the MTA couldn’t even explain how many hours Caputo worked last year, or what his overtime rate was.
“Looking into Caputo,” spokesman Shams Tarek told The Post Tuesday afternoon — then failed to respond to multiple follow-up queries.
After five hours, all he could explain is what a chief measurement operator does — claiming Caputo is “one of only a few people” who can operate an “advanced track-geometry car,” which examines the rails for defects.
Tarek said Caputo retired this month after 30 years on the job — and his hefty final pay year could give a boost to his pension.
The news comes right after the LIRR on Sunday hit riders with fare hikes of up to $15 on monthly tickets and $5.75 on weeklies. Customers say the ­humongous worker paychecks are a slap in the face.
“This is outrageous,” said Dini Morbillo, 56, a physician who spends $275 a month on her LIRR pass and gasped when she heard what Caputo took home.
“He is making more than me — who the hell is Thomas Caputo? Why isn’t there transparency?”
Overtime payments surged to more than $1.3 billion across the entire MTA last year, up from $1.2 billion the year before, according to Empire Center data.
Of that, the LIRR shelled out $224.6 million for overtime, up nearly $50 million from the previous year’s $175.4 million.
And yet that same year, the commuter rail line’s on-time performance dropped to its worst levels in nearly two decades.
Nine of the top 10 overtime earners in the MTA in 2018 worked for the LIRR.
They include surfacing foreman Dallas Bazemore III, who made $279,289 in overtime.
Track worker Marco Pazmino earned a regular salary of just under $55,000, but fattened his pay with another $256,177 in OT.
Meanwhile, New York City Transit chief Andy Byford — the man charged with fixing the Big Apple’s dilapidated subway system — was only the 21st highest earner in the MTA last year, taking home $313,468.
Even LIRR workers were outraged at what some of their colleagues are raking in.
“This guy is making almost $500,000?! Wow. I don’t even knowwh at a chief measurement operator is; all I know is I want in that,” said one customer-service worker, who wouldn’t give his name. “I’m in the wrong department.”
Tarek justified the megasized paychecks by saying the agency has been working on major upgrades recently, and claiming it is often cheaper to pay an existing employee overtime than to hire another person for the same work.
Caputo couldn’t be reached for comment.

Kamala Harris backtracks, now says criminals like Boston bomber ‘should be deprived’ of right to vote

U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., is now backtracking after initially saying “we should have that conversation” about allowing criminals currently in prison -- such as the Boston Marathon bomber -- to vote.
Appearing at a televised town hall event following 2020 Democratic frontrunner Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. -- who made headlines by advocating for voting rights for felons serving time. -- Harris was also asked to weigh in.
“I think we should have that conversation,” Harris told CNN anchor Don Lemon.
Well, that conversation appears to have ended.
Sanders had said that those convicted of sexual assault and of crimes like terrorism -- like Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev -- should be able to vote in order for the U.S. to sustain a “vibrant democracy” and to increase voter turnout.
But on Tuesday, while speaking to a press gaggle in New Hampshire, Harris expanded on her remarks at the CNN town hall and gave what her national press secretary Ian Sams called a “thoughtful answer.”
Harris called the issue of allowing felons to vote in prison “complex” and said she was going to “talk to experts” about the matter.
She added that there was “a lot of work to do” regarding 6 million people who are currently in prison without voting rights.
“Do I think that people who commit murder, people who are terrorists should be deprived of their rights? Yeah, I do. I’m a prosecutor,” Harris said. “There has to be serious consequences for the most extreme types of crimes.”
Also during Monday night’s town hall, Harris joined her colleague, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., in calling for President Trump’s impeachment. She also vowed to take executive action on gun control if Congress doesn’t act in her first 100 days in office as president.

Rush Limbaugh: Joe Biden is Democrats' best chance in 2020 but has no chance in primary

Conservative talk radio show host Rush Limbaugh said Monday that former Vice President Joseph Biden is the Democrats' best chance to defeat President Trump in 2020 but has no chance to win the primary.
"Here's the thing: Joe Biden is probably the best chance they've got, and he doesn't have a chance. They're probably -- Joe Biden? And crazy Bernie [Sanders]? And mayor Pete [Buttigieg]? Three white guys, two of them are brontosauruses from 'Jurassic Park,' and that isn't going to sit well with the rest of this party, which has gone so far left," Limbaugh said on "The Story with Martha MacCallum."
Limbaugh also said Biden may not be fully committed to running in 2020.
"I don't think, Biden is putting off his announcement, I don't know how badly he really wants this, and you have to really want this if you are going to have any chance of winning it," Limbaugh said.
Fox News learned Tuesday that Biden's long-awaited 2020 presidential bid announcement has been pushed back from Wednesday to Thursday, with plans for the former vice president to follow up with an appearance in Pittsburgh next week.
The radio host also went after 2020 candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., criticizing her proposals including forgiving student loans.
"Pocahontas is not going to be the nominee. These Democrats are all in the process of trying to out-leftist or out-liberal each other, and they're in a contest of who can give away the most," Limbaugh said.
He continued, "None of this is real, none of this can happen. This is disinformation, and it is really, I think it is an indication of just how little they think of their own voters, that their own voters don't even want to work. They don't even want to achieve. They don't even want to pursue excellence. They just want to have their hands out and vote for whoever is going to give them the most. What a way to ruin a life."
Limbaugh took time to address Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report, defending Trump and accusing former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of colluding with the Russians.
"Hillary Clinton and her pals in the Obama Department of Justice and the FBI, they are the ones who colluded with the Russians. They are the ones that gave us this entirely, totally bogus Steele dossier," Limbaugh said.
"Talk about irony, for Hillary Clinton to be talking about impeaching Donald Trump. Hillary Clinton needs to be investigated, she needs to be indicted, and she needs to be in jail -- and many of her co-conspirators in this whole sordid affair, which amounted to nothing more than a silent coup to overturn the election results in 2016."
Fox News' Paul Steinhauser, Nick Kalman and Martha MacCallum contributed to this report.

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