2020 contender Kamala Harris calls for ban of 'right to work' laws

Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., indicated on Saturday that she would use the "bully pulpit" to fight "right-to-work" laws, describing them as an attack on workers' rights.
"The barriers to organized labor being able to organize and strike are something that have grown over a period of time," the 2020 presidential hopeful said while speaking at the National Forum on Wages and Working People.
At the event, Harris emphasized the bully pulpit and executive authority to fight for workers' rights and specifically mentioned right-to-work laws.
"It has to be about, for example, banning right-to-work laws," she said.
The event, organized by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the Center for American Progress, sought to "provide an opportunity for thought leaders to go beyond talking points and share concrete plans to rebalance our economy and democracy," according to its website.
Harris' comments came after years of states like Michigan and Virginia debating controversial right-to-work laws — which would allow workers to exempt themselves from joining a union or paying its fees — as well as last year's Supreme Court decision, in Janus v. AFSCME, which said mandatory public union fees violated the First Amendment.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., a fellow 2020 contender, also said in April that he would work to ban right-to-work laws, which exist in 26 states.
Either could face off against President Trump, whom many saw as a more appealing candidate for workers and labor unions given his stances on immigration and trade.
Trump has praised the Janus decision, describing it as a "Big loss for the coffers of the Democrats!"
And during his 2016 campaign, Trump supported right-to-work legislation
"We've had great support from [union] workers, the people that work, the real workers, but I love the right to work," he said. "I like it better because it is lower. It is better for the people," he added.

Trump slams Jussie Smollett case as a 'disgrace to our nation' during Wisconsin rally

President Donald Trump derided actor Jussie Smollett as "third rate" during a Wisconsin rally on Saturday and called his legal trouble — in which he allegedly lied about Trump supporters attacking him in a hate crime — a "disgrace to our nation."
"That case in Chicago is a disgrace to our nation," he said, after defending his supporters. "He said 'I was beaten up by MAGA country.' Can you believe it?" Trump said, referring to Smollett during a rally in Green Bay.
"Turned out to be a total lie," he added.
Smollett's case ignited a media firestorm after the “Empire” actor, who is gay and black, said his alleged attackers yelled, "This is MAGA country."
A grand jury indicted him on 16 charges for allegedly lying about the attack but State's Attorney Kim Foxx controversially dropped the charges. Foxx's decision provoked widespread criticism and appeared to prompt some of her staff to resign.
Smollett became the target of a civil lawsuit in April as the city's law enforcement demanded payment, potentially above $130,000, to cover the costs of their investigation into his alleged attack.
His alleged assailants, brothers Abel and Ola Osundairo, also filed a defamation suit against Smollett's attorneys for continuing to accuse them of perpetrating a homophobic and racist attack.
On Saturday, thousands, including some who stayed the night and waited in the cold just to be first in the door, attended the “Make America Great Again” rally.
"There's no place I'd rather be than right here in America's heartland," Trump told the audience Saturday. "Is there any place that's more fun than a Trump rally?"

"There's no place I'd rather be than right here in America's heartland. Is there any place that's more fun than a Trump rally?"
— President Trump

The event occurred on the same night as the White House Correspondents' Association dinner, which Trump skipped for the third year in a row.
His speech came just hours after a tragic shooting that left one dead and several others injured at a synagogue in California.
"Our entire nation mourns the loss of life," Trump said, before noting that his administration "forcefully" condemned anti-Semitism.
In 2016, Trump won Wisconsin -- often considered a swing state with strong labor interests -- with just a slim 1 percent margin over former Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. According to a statewide survey released in April, Trump has maintained nearly 50 percent of the state's support during his third year in office.
While 52 percent of registered voters disapproved of his job performance, 46 percent approved, the Marquette Law School survey found.
Trump's rally came just after he saw a 3.2 percent GDP report and Special Counsel Robert Mueller's report that expressed concerns about obstruction of justice but made no formal accusations of that or "collusion" with Russia.
But as the 2020 election cycle ramped up, Trump seemed to face heightened criticism from Democratic presidential candidates and politicians who continued pressing his administration on the issue – and, in some cases, calling for impeachment proceedings.
During his speech, Trump took aim at his 2020 rivals Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., former Vice President Joe Biden, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. - whom he referred to as "Crazy Bernie," "Sleepy Joe," and "Pocahontas." He also derided Democrats, whom he said had never been angrier, for putting all their hopes in what he called the "collusion delusion," a reference to speculation surrounding the Mueller investigation.
Some in the Democratic field have also attacked Trump's policies and, as Biden did, the president's character. Before the rally, Sanders ran an ad in the Green Bay Press-Gazette, accusing the president of lying to Wisconsin workers. Sanders, in the front page ad, portrayed himself as someone who would end "corporate greed" in the state.
Trump also defended his economic record and touted efforts on trade, promising that factories would return to the country and indicating that he wouldn't settle for an unfair deal with China. America, Trump said, was the "piggybank" that people kept taking advantage of on trade.
He also blasted Democrats as extreme, pointing out their positions on late-term abortion, the "Green New Deal" and other economic policies, and immigration. Democrats, Trump argued, would bring the country economic and financial "ruin."
The Republican Party, Trump said, was the party of all Americans while Democrats were the party of hoaxes and late-term abortion, among other things.
The president also spoke on the migration crisis in which thousands flooded the U.S.-Mexico border and created a thorny situation in which the administration could no longer hold some detainees. After vowing to build the southern border wall, he accused Democrats of preferring "open borders" which, he said, would bring "tremendous crime" and inflame the drug crisis.

Participants in AOC's 'fun run' didn’t know they were donating to her campaign

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez held a 5k in Queens Saturday that she billed as “a Family Fun Run supporting U.S. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal on the Saturday following Earth Day.”
But many of the 400 runners didn’t realize their $30 registration fees were going directly into the lawmaker’s campaign coffers.
“We’re getting together for our own health, for our planet’s health … and to fight for the Green New Deal together,” the freshman Democrat told the participants before they set off.
Environmentally conscious supporters — who jogged through Astoria Park alongside a beaming, strolling AOC — believed their money was going to help save the planet.
“It’s going to help raise awareness and educate people,” a female runner told The Post.
“I think it’s really for this particular New Green Deal,” said Brian Schwartz of Long Island. “No question.”
“It’s to help the environment. To support the Green New Deal,” another woman said. “It’s a good cause.”
A vaguely worded notices on AOC’s Facebook page — saying that the run would support “U.S. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez & the Green New Deal” — worsened the confusion.
But the fine print on a third event-related website revealed the truth.
“Registration fees are contributions to AOC for Congress,” reads the legal disclosure on aoc5k.com, which lists the Federal Election Commission rules that donors must follow.
“It was a campaign fundraiser,” Ocasio-Cortez spokesman Corbin Trent said confirmed.
The participants paid more than $11,000 all told.
Even kids as young as 3 became unknowing political donors — ponying up $20 fees to join a kids’ 1k.
But by fudging the fact that those fees were actually campaign contributions, AOC may have enticed constituents into inadvertently breaking federal election laws.
Parents, for example, can’t contribute their own funds in a child’s name.
The amount raised is a drop in the bucket for AOC, whose superstar status and combative Twitter feed vaulted her into the fundraising stratosphere in the first quarter of this year, when she raised $726,000 through online solicitations.
But only 4 percent of that total came from constituents in her own district.
At Saturday’s event, 198 runners came from the Bronx and from Queens neighborhoods within the 14th congressional district. The other 200 came from elsewhere.
Those contributions will improve her home-grown fundraising share.
Some participants felt fooled.
“The site says it’s to benefit her environmental plan,” said one supporter who would not give his name. “If it is going to go directly to her campaign they should have said so.”

Adam Schiff, D-Calif. Cartoons

Schiff hedges on Trump impeachment, says instead, 'Vote his a-- out of office'

He is the one that needs to be thrown out of office.

U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and a vocal critic of President Trump, said Friday night that he had “no expectations” that Trump would be indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller at the conclusion of the Russia investigation.
“Even if the evidence supported it, because [Mueller] is fundamentally conservative -- and I don’t mean left-right conservative -- but he was going to follow the established policy. He was not going to make new ground," Schiff said during an appearance on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher.
"So I didn't think it was realistic to expect that [Mueller] would indict the president," Schiff continued, "and those that did, I think, were unrealistic in their expectations."
Last week Attorney General William Barr released a redacted version of the full Mueller report that cleared the president of collusion with Russia. Nevertheless, House Democrats are continuing their investigations into the president's actions -- while Republicans want answers about how the investigation began.
Schiff argued that the report ultimately did prove that Trump was “unfit for the presidency.”
“I do think [Mueller] laid out what we needed to see, which is that the Russians were engaged in a systemic effort to interfere in our election, that the Trump campaign welcomed it, embraced it, built it into their plan, made full use of it, lied about it, covered it up and then obstructed the investigation into it,” Schiff said.
“And if we had any doubt before about this president's fitness for office there was no doubt remaining. He is unfit for the presidency.”
Maher pressed Schiff on the Democratic Party’s continued focus on the Mueller report.
"Now, it looks like you’re stalking him,” before bringing up impeachment, Maher said.
Schiff hesitated to commit to impeachment, focusing instead on the 2020 election.
“”I’m not there yet on impeachment. I may get there. He may get me there,” Schiff said. “At the end of the day, Bill, there's only one way to deal with this problem, whether we impeach him or not. And that is to vote his a-- out of office.”

"At the end of the day, Bill, there's only one way to deal with this problem, whether we impeach him or not. And that is to vote his a-- out of office."
— U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif.

Schiff told Maher he is advising his colleagues as well as the Democratic Party's presidential candidates to not talk about Russia. He also began making his case for whom he'll support in 2020 -- anyone except President Trump.
“And I'll tell you who I'm behind in 2020 and I'm behind them the heart and soul," Schiff said. "Any living adult 2020. Anyone who gets the nomination. We all need to get behind them whether we were for them or not for them."

Rashida Tlaib says she was 'afraid' of Americans after 9/11 -- and that fear pushed her into politics

U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., once said her fear of Americans after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks pushed her to be more involved in politics and her community.
Tlaib, a Palestinian-American lawmaker who first drew national attention with a profane call for the impeachment of President Trump soon after she took office in January, made her comments in a clip filmed for Makers, a media company that tries to “accelerate the women’s movement through stories of real-life experiences that ignite passion and action.”
In the video, filmed months ago as part of the “Maker of the week” segment which is currently featured prominently on the outlet's homepage, Tlaib said she was “afraid” of her fellow Americans after the terror attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.
“I was probably my second year in law school when 9/11 happened. And I was -- I was really terrified of what was going to happen to my husband, who's only a green card holder at the time,” she said.
“I immediately called my brothers and told them to be very careful who you hang out with, telling my sisters, you know, just be real careful out there, and being really afraid of my fellow Americans.”

“I immediately called my brothers and told them to be very careful who you hang out with, telling my sisters, you know, just be real careful out there, and being really afraid of my fellow Americans.”
— Rashida Tlaib

She added that the attack and the fear pushed her toward public service and becoming more involved in her community.
“It really pushed me to be more involved, and I got really curious and really angry. And I think that combination got me, you know, in front of a number of issues in the city of Detroit,” she said.
Tlaib has been facing criticism not only for her calls for Trump’s impeachment but also for making troubling comments concerning Israel, with some comments perceived as anti-Semitic, and associating with far-left figures that have endorsed Lebanon-based Hezbollah and Palestinian terrorist groups.
One of America’s oldest Jewish organizations, the Zionist Organization of America, called on Wednesday for Tlaib's removal from congressional committees and from the Democratic Party for her “anti-Israel record” and ties to “terrorists, anti-Semites and conspiracy theorists.”
“Rashida Tlaib’s anti-Israel record was already well-known before she was elected in last year’s midterm elections,” the ZOA editorial article says.
“She calls Israel a ‘racist country’ on the basis of the lie that Israel discriminates against those ‘darker skinned,’ supports the destruction of Israel in favor of an Arab-dominated state (‘It has to be one state’), ‘absolutely’ backs withholding U.S. aid from Israel, and openly supports the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which is committed to international ostracism and weakening of Israel with a view to its eventual elimination.”
The same article includes a list of people with whom Tlaib has been photographed, or about whom Tlaib has posted social media messages, and includes information about their alleged links to bombings or other crimes.
“It is perfectly clear that Rashida Tlaib is not in the smallest degree ashamed, and has not the slightest inhibition about, being publicly being associated with these anti-Semites, terrorists and glorifiers of Jew-murderers," ZOA National President Morton A. Klein and Chairman Mark Levenson said in a joint statement.
“The Democratic Party must do the only honorable thing," they continued, "which is to expel her from the party and remove her from Congressional committees."
Fox News’ Dom Calicchio contributed to this report.

Warren blasts Biden's 'swanky private fundraiser' with lobbyists after launch of his WH bid

Democrats eat their own.

Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren slammed fellow candidate Joe Biden for attending a “swanky private fundraiser” after he announced his candidacy and raised staggering sums for his campaign.
Warren, who has made a point in the 2020 race of shunning donations from corporate PACs or lobbyists, took a swipe at Biden in a campaign email sent to her supporters, noting that the fundraiser he attended featured Comcast executive David Cohen and health insurance executive Daniel Hilferty.
“In the first 24 hours of his presidential campaign (welcome to the race!), Joe Biden raised $6.3 million,” Warren’s email read wrote.
“How did Joe Biden raise so much money in one day? Well, it helps that he hosted a swanky private fundraiser for wealthy donors at the home of the guy who runs Comcast's lobbying shop.”

“How did Joe Biden raise so much money in one day? Well, it helps that he hosted a swanky private fundraiser for wealthy donors at the home of the guy who runs Comcast's lobbying shop.”
— U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.

“Elizabeth is building a grassroots movement without holding any big-money private fundraisers where you can only talk to her if you write a big check first. Without taking a dime from federally registered lobbyists or PACs of any kind. It’s the right thing to do,” the email added.
The attack also comes amid reports that Biden’s campaign raised a massive $6.3 million in the first 24 hours, beating his opponents' first-day fundraising efforts, though about $700,000 came from the fundraiser he attended, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Biden beat former U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke’s $6.1 million pull on his first day and Sen. Bernie Sanders’ $5.9 million.
But Warren’s swipe at the fundraiser attendance shows the uphill battle awaiting the former vice president to shake off criticism that he’s not running a genuine grassroots campaign and is instead being propped up by wealthy Democratic donors.
Yet the data appear to support the concerns of Warren and others. Figures show Biden raising money from 97,000 unique donors – significantly fewer than Sanders’ 225,000 contributors and O’Rourke’s 128,000 donors.

Ocasio-Cortez, Omar fire back after NRA official says 'real America' will reject socialist policies

U.S. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar attacked NRA lobbyist Chris Cox on Friday after he warned of the “socialist wave” engulfing America and promised there will be a “rude awakening” when “real America” votes against those espousing far-left ideas.
“The socialist wave we warned was coming is here. And it’s not just the two coasts that are underwater, the wave is hitting the heartland of America. But as this circus goes on, millions of Americans will see how far outside the mainstream these socialists have become,” Cox, executive director of the NRA's Institute for Legislative Action (ILA), said Friday during a speech at the Second Amendment advocacy group’s annual convention in Indianapolis.
“Friends, do you think Nancy Pelosi and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are mainstream in the United States of America? Are they in for a rude awakening in November of next year when the real America goes to the polls? I’m talking about the America you and I know,” he added.

“Friends, do you think Nancy Pelosi and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are mainstream in the United States of America? Are they in for a rude awakening in November of next year when the real America goes to the polls? I’m talking about the America you and I know.”
— NRA lobbyist Chris Cox

“The one where hardworking people put their heads down, mind their own business, raise their families, and do the right thing. That’s the America the NRA fights for every single day. It’s who we are.”
Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, went Twitter to fire back against the NRA official, lambasting Cox for suggesting residents in her district aren’t part of the real America.
“Civics lesson for the NRA: As much as they may not like it, the Bronx and Queens are part of ‘the real America,’ too,” she tweeted. “Wild that the NRA is suggesting the voters of NY-14 aren’t ‘real Americans’ bc they don’t think assault weapons in school classrooms is a good idea.”
In March, Ocasio-Cortez floated a four-point plan in which she suggested banning semi-automatic firearms, which make up the vast majority of legally owned firearms in the country. She also called for passing “Universal Background checks” and other policies.

Omar chimes in

Omar, the embattled Minnesota Democrat, who has long decried the influence of the NRA, also jumped on the official’s remarks, tweeting: “Can “the real America” please stand up...This Ain't It, Chief!”
Cox pointed out earlier during the speech that there’s a leftward shift among the Democrats that is putting the party further out of the mainstream and on the fringes.
“It used to be that everybody knew that campaigning as a gun-banning socialist was a surefire way to ship your own sink, I mean sink your own ship before it left harbor,” he said.
“But this year, if you aren’t willing to openly attack the Second Amendment, if you don’t angrily call for every gun ban scheme imaginable including complete disarmament, you will be booed off the Democrat debate stage.”