Kellyanne Conway says critics employ Hatch Act to 'silence' her support for Trump

Counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway responded to critics Monday after formally defying a Hatch Act-related subpoena from the House Oversight Committee.
Her opponents are concerned about her effectiveness at her job and hoped to silence her, Conway said Monday on "Hannity."
"I'm concerned that there's such a weaponization and politicization of this thing called the Hatch Act," she said.
The Hatch Act limits political activity by federal workers. Congress approved the Hatch Act in 1939 to limit partisan activity by federal employees to ensure the government functions fairly and effectively.
The Office of Special Counsel -- separate from the office formerly run by Special Counsel Robert Mueller -- opened two cases focused on allegations Conway violated the Hatch Act by engaging in “both official and political activity” -- during her media appearances and on her Twitter account, @KellyannePolls.
The report stated, "Ms. Conway regularly participated in official media interviews in her capacity as a White House spokesperson to answer reporters’ questions about the Administration. Beginning in February 2019, Ms. Conway, during official media appearances, engaged in a pattern of partisan attacks on several Democratic Party candidates shortly after they announced their candidacy for President,” detailing instances involving Sens. Cory Booker and Elizabeth Warren, and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke.
The OSC stated that in one Feb. 19 interview on "Fox & Friends," Conway “insinuated that Senator Booker was ‘sexist’ and a ‘tinny’ ‘motivational speaker,’” and claimed Warren, D-Mass., was “’lying’” about her ethnicity.
Conway said that no matter how heavy the pressure is on her to keep a low profile, she will continue to publicly support the president's policies.
"They're not going to silence me," she said. "They're not going to take away my First Amendment rights."
Conway also “attacked” O’Rourke for not “thinking the women running are good enough to be President.”
Fox News' Brooke Singman contributed to this report

Acting CBP Commissioner: Some critics either misinformed or lying about agency, actions

U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents are being wrongfully criticized and attacked by misinformed or intentionally misguided people, according to Mark Morgan, the acting CBP commissioner said.
Law enforcement and the intelligence community are likely successfully tracking potential threats against the agency and its infrastructure, Morgan claimed Monday on "The Ingraham Angle."
"It's absolutely dangerous," he said of some of the opposition to the agency's mission of border enforcement.
"I have full confidence that the law enforcement mechanisms and intelligence agencies are watching these groups."
"A lone wolf or violent extremist are very hard to prevent," he said, referring to a 69-year-old Antifa activist shot and killed by Washington state police after attacking an ICE facility in the Evergreen State.
The group Seattle Antifascist Action described assailant Willem Van Spronsen a "good friend and comrade" who "took a stand against the fascist detention center in Tacoma" and "became a martyr who gave his life to the struggle against fascism."
Van Spronsen was armed with a rifle and incendiary devices when he launched his assault on the Northwest Detention Center around 4 a.m. Saturday, according to the Tacoma Police Department. Employees reported he was throwing 'incendiary devices' and setting vehicles on fire and the first officers on the scene said he was wearing a sachet and carrying flares.
In light of van Spronsen's attack, Morgan slammed some of the rhetoric from agency opponents and critics.
"The rhetoric that's out there from our own elected leaders -- they're attacking the men and women of ICE, they're attacking the men and women of CBP," he said.
"It's unjust, it's unfair, it's misinformed, and outright sometimes, they're just lying to the American people and it's undoubtedly fueling this."
Of the comparison between border detention facilities and World War II-era concentration camps, Morgan said the two are completely different.
"In the concentration camps, the Nazis were killing people. Customs and Border Protection are saving lives," he said.
Fox News' Travis Fedschun contributed to this report.

Hannity: 'The radicals are in charge'

Fox News' Sean Hannity focused Monday night on the change within the Democratic Party, declaring once again that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., is now the leader and that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is "powerless."
"They are on the verge of an all-out civil war. Nancy Pelosi has lost complete control of her radical socialist base. Freshman Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez, Congresswoman Tlaib and Omar and Ayanna Pressley are now running the show," Hannity said on his television show.
"Speaker Pelosi is now totally powerless."
Hannity was reacting to past comments made by the four congresswomen who responded to President Trump's controversial tweets Sunday calling for the progressive congresswomen to "go back" to where they came from.
Trump doubled down Monday calling out the lawmakers for their Anti-American "hate."
Hannity warned that "radicals" within the Democratic Party will use identity politics to attack any that oppose them including other Democrats to "reshape America."
"It does not matter what Speaker Pelosi says, what she does. The radicals who are in charge, anyone who opposes them of course quickly labeled xenophobic, homophobic, Islamophobic, racist, sexist, and a bigot and want dirty air and water," Hannity told his audience.
"The so-called 'squad' of far left freshmen congresswomen are now using identity politics even against members of their own party. The end goal is to fundamentally reshape America."
The Fox News host also pointed out the influence this "wing" has on the Democratic presidential candidates.
"The base of the Democratic Party is so powerful that every 2020 hopeful has adopted their fringe socialist policies. And if they don't adopt it completely they are trashed by many of the four," Hannity said.
Hannity blasted the four congresswomen for calling for the impeachment of President Trump Monday during a press conference and for their vision of the country.
"They don't want to improve this country. They want to remake this country into something we all know will fail," Hannity said. "They want to impeach the one person that's been standing in their way."
Fox News' Gregg Re contributed to this report.

Extra protection sought for certain lawmakers after Trump's comments about 'squad' (Crying Dems)

House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie G. Thompson, D-Miss., was seeking extra protection for members of Congress on Monday after President Trump’s tweets and remarks about the progressive “squad.”
Trump’s remarks apparently were directed at four congresswomen: Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan. All are American citizens and three of the four were born in the U.S.
Far from backing down, Trump on Monday dug in on comments he had initially made a day earlier on Twitter that if lawmakers “hate our country,” they can go back to their “broken and crime-infested” countries.

The House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Rep. Bennie G. Thompson, D-Miss., right, is seeking extra protection for members of Congress. The letter is addressed to Senate Sergeant at Arms Michael Stenger, left, because, this year, he heads the Capitol Police Board. (Getty, File)

“If you’re not happy in the U.S., if you’re complaining all the time, you can leave, you can leave right now,” he said.
In the letter for House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving and Senate Sergeant at Arms Michael Stenger, Thompson argued that the Capitol Police Board should meet to “analyze the current threat environment and set thresholds for enhanced safety of Members.”
Thompson asked for a meeting within 48 hours and a classified readout of the meeting.
The letter was addressed to Stenger because he has headed the Capitol Police Board this year.
Thompson said security officials should set “thresholds for enhanced security for certain targeted Members, and evaluate threat streams with law enforcement partners in Member districts. Being proactive in this instance is vital to the safety of not only these targeted Members, but all Members of Congress.”
Fox News has been told that despite Thompson’s pleas, other lawmakers have faced more serious threats than members of the squad ahead of Trump's tweets.

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O’Rourke says he and wife descended from slave owners, has ‘more personal connection’ to slavery

Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke revealed on Twitter Sunday that he and his wife Amy are both descended from slave owners.
“Something that we’ve been talking about in town hall meetings – the legacy of slavery in the United States – now has a much more personal connection,” O’Rourke said. “I was recently given documents showing that both Amy and I are descended from people who owned slaves.”
O’Rourke included a link to a medium.com article he wrote titled “Rose and Eliza,” in reference to two slaves one his distance relatives owned.
“A paternal great-great-great grandfather of mine, Andrew Cowan Jasper, owned these two women in the 1850s,” O’Rourke wrote.

Democratic presidential candidate, former U.S. Rep. Beto O'Rourke speaks at the Manchester Democrats annual Potluck Picnic at Oak Park in Manchester, N.H. (AP)

He added that records also showed that an ancestor of his wife, Amy, owned slaves while another was part of the Confederate Army.
O’Rourke noted that he’s spoken about the legacy of slavery in the U.S. while campaigning, but that such discussions now have “a much more personal connection.”
O’Rourke’s disclosure comes as discussions of reparations for slavery have become a hot-button issue among Democratic candidates for the 2020 presidential election.
Last month House Democrats held a hearing on reparations for slavery for the first time in more than a decade. The panel’s aim was to “examine, through open and constructive discourse, the legacy of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.”
Fox News Gerren Keith Gaynor and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Trump, after tweet backlash, hits Dems 'sticking up for' people bad-mouthing America

After triggering backlash over tweets urging progressive congresswomen to go back to their "broken and crime infested" home countries, President Trump appeared unbowed Sunday night, suggesting it was "so sad" to see Democrats sticking up for the lawmakers.
"So sad to see the Democrats sticking up for people who speak so badly of our Country and who, in addition, hate Israel with a true and unbridled passion. Whenever confronted, they call their adversaries, including Nancy Pelosi, 'RACIST,'" Trump tweeted. "Their disgusting language... and the many terrible things they say about the United States must not be allowed to go unchallenged."
He continued, "If the Democrat Party wants to continue to condone such disgraceful behavior, then we look even more forward to seeing you at the ballot box in 2020!"
Trump’s earlier attack drew a searing condemnation from Democrats who labeled the remarks racist and breathtakingly divisive. The president’s tweets led Democrats in large part to set aside their internal rifts to rise up in a united chorus against the president. Republicans remained largely silent.
Trump's tweets did not name any specific congresswomen. However, among his frequent targets is Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., the first Somali native elected to Congress and one of its first Muslim women. She was born in Somalia but spent much of her childhood in a Kenyan refugee camp as civil war tore apart her home country.
New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is of Puerto Rican descent, was born in the Bronx, N.Y., and raised in suburban Westchester County. Trump's latest tweets appeared to reference Ocasio-Cortez; she had accused House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., of "singling out" women of color last week, although she later denied she was accusing Pelosi of racism.
Ocasio-Cortez had fired back at Trump's initial tweets. "You are angry because you can’t conceive of an America that includes us. You rely on a frightened America for your plunder," she tweeted, later adding: "But you know what’s the rub of it all, Mr. President? On top of not accepting an America that elected us, you cannot accept that we don’t fear you, either. You can’t accept that we will call your bluff & offer a positive vision for this country. And that’s what makes you seethe."
Omar, for her part, responded to Trump's latest tweets by quoting author James Baldwin: "There are few things more dreadful than dealing with a man who knows he is going under, in his own eyes, and in the eyes of others. Nothing can help that man. What is left of that man flees from what is left of human attention."
Pelosi tweeted, "When @realDonaldTrump tells four American Congresswomen to go back to their countries, he reaffirms his plan to 'Make America Great Again' has always been about making America white again. Our diversity is our strength and our unity is our power."

Peter Thiel says FBI, CIA should investigate if Chinese intelligence infiltrated Google: report

Billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel on Sunday called for the FBI and CIA to investigate whether Chinese intelligence had infiltrated Google, according to a report.
Thiel, who supported Trump in 2016 and Facebook board member, made the comments during a speech at the National Conservatism Conference in Washington. He said the FBI and CIA needed to ask Google three questions to determine if the tech giant had been compromised by Chinese intelligence, Axios reported.

FILE: A Google Home Hub is displayed in New York.  (AP)

“Number one: How many foreign intelligence agencies have infiltrated your Manhattan Project for AI (artificial intelligence)?” Thiel reportedly asked. “Number two: Does Google’s senior management consider itself to have been thoroughly infiltrated by Chinese intelligence?”
Thiel then slammed Google for its decision to work with the Chinese military while refusing to renew a contract with the U.S. Department of Defense.
“Number three: Is it because they consider themselves to be so thoroughly infiltrated that they have engaged in the seemingly treasonous decision to work with the Chinese military and not with the US military,” Thiel said.
Google has faced criticism over its work on a censored search engine – “Project Dragonfly” – that would allow it to return to China after leaving in 2010 over human rights concerns. The company dropped the project after members of the company's privacy team raised complaints.
Other reports said that Google decided not to renew its contract for Project Maven – a controversial military program that uses artificial intelligence to improve drone targeting – which expired earlier this year.
Google did not immediately respond to Fox News’ request for comment.
Fox News' Louis Casiano contributed to this report.