Virginia House advances gun control measures -- just days after gun-rights rally

As the debate over stricter gun laws rages on in the state capitol of Richmond, Virginia, West Virginia lawmakers have signed on to new legislation that would accept revolting Virginia counties and towns who want to join the Mountain State. West Virginia Delegate Gary Howell discusses this new legislation and if he agrees with some critics who claim a second Civil War is brewing.

RICHMOND, Va.  — Democrats in the Virginia House are advancing a package of gun-control measures less than a week after tens of thousands of pro-gun advocates from around the country rallied at the state Capitol.
But the advancing bills don't yet include a proposed assault weapon ban, a top priority for Gov. Ralph Northam and one that's drawn fierce resistance from gun-rights advocates.
A Democratic-led House committee voted Friday for several pieces of gun legislation that a Republican majority has blocked for years. Those bills include limiting handgun purchases to once a month; universal background checks on gun purchases; allowing localities to ban guns in public buildings, parks and other areas; and a red flag bill that would allow authorities to temporarily take guns away from anyone deemed to be dangerous to themselves or others.
“Our action today is for the families who have lost loved ones as a result of gun violence,” House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn said.
The measures will go to the full House for a vote, likely next week, before going to the Senate, which has already passed some gun-control bills of its own.

A pro-gun demonstrator holds a sign outside the Virginia Statehouse prior to a gun-rights rally in Richmond, Jan. 20, 2020. (Associated Press)

The House committee passed seven out of eight gun bills that Northam has said were his priority. But it did not take up an assault weapon ban, which some Democrats said they don't think can pass this year. The Senate has already killed off its version of the bill and some moderate Democratic senators said they won't support the legislation, which would outlaw the popular AR-15-style rifles.
Virginia Secretary of Public Safety and Homeland Security Brian Moran said they are still working on the bill and there's plenty of time left to get it passed.
“It's an important issue for the governor,” Moran said. “We've seen in mass shootings, these are the weapons that are used.”
Virginia has become a key flash point in the national debate over gun violence.
Northam and Democratic lawmakers have credited their focus on gun control for helping them win full control of the General Assembly for the first time in more than two decades. Guns were a key topic of last year's legislative elections — particularly after a mass shooting in Virginia Beach claimed a dozen lives — and gun-control groups heavily funded Democratic candidates.
On Monday, tens of thousands of gun-rights activists from around the country rallied peacefully at the Virginia Capitol to protest plans by the state’s Democratic leadership to pass gun-control legislation.
Some of the most vocal opposition has focused on plans to ban AR-15s and other assault weapons. Gun-rights advocates have accused Democrats of wanting to confiscate such rifles from current gun owners. Northam has said he has no interest in doing so.
An estimated 8 million AR-style guns have been sold since they were introduced to the public in the 1960s. The weapons are known as easy to use, easy to clean and easy to modify with a variety of scopes, stocks and rails.

VP Mike Pence meets Pope Francis in private audience at Vatican

VATICAN CITY — U.S. Vice President Mike Pence met with Pope Francis at the Vatican on Friday, discussing the anti-abortion march in Washington and telling the pontiff, "You made me a hero" back home by granting him a private audience.
The pope and the vice president had a private hour-long conversation. Pence was beaming after the meeting, which appeared to be particularly cordial.
The hero description apparently referred to Pence's Roman Catholic family upbringing. He later became an evangelical Christian.
Before journalists were ushered out of the library, Pence told Francis: "I want to extend the warmest greeting on behalf of President Donald Trump, who so enjoyed his visit here.''
Trump had a private audience with Francis at the Vatican in 2017, and on Friday in Washington, the U.S. president was attending an anti-abortion rally in Washington. Trump is the first sitting U.S. president to do so in the history of the annual March for Life’s history.
Pence's office said the march in the U.S. capital was among the topics discussed with the pontiff. Catholic church teaching forbids abortion, and Pence himself has been staunchly anti-abortion.

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, second from left, and part of his delegation are given a private tour of the Vatican after his private audience with Pope Francis, at the Vatican, Friday, Jan. 24, 2020. (Associated Press)

In an interview right after his Vatican visit, Pence told U.S. Catholic media outlet EWTN News that it was a “great privilege” to meet with Francis.
He said meeting with Francis on a day when “literally hundreds of thousands of Americans, including many Catholic Americans, are gathered on our National Mall in Washington D.C. standing up for the right to life was a particular joy for me."
Pence also gushed pride for Trump, hailing him as the “most pro-life president in American history.”
Trump has embraced the anti-abortion agenda in a nod to evangelical Christians, a politically influential bloc in U.S. politics. But in 1999, Trump had gone on record in an interview describing himself as “pro-choice in every respect.”
In Friday's interview, Pence also praised Francis for his “passion for the sanctity of life.”
The vice president's office also said Pence and the pope talked about the crisis in Venezuela and displaced religious minorities in the Middle East.
The Vatican didn't say what was discussed.

Pope Francis meets with U.S. Vice President Mike Pence, left, on the occasion of their private audience, at the Vatican, Friday, Jan. 24, 2020. (Associated Press)

Francis has repeatedly cited the social and economic hardships in Venezuela, in his native continent of South America. He also has decried that Christian minorities in parts of the Middle East have been forced to flee fighting or persecution, including in Iraq and Syria.
Pence, with his wife and daughter-in-law, were greeted at Rome’s Ciampino airport by the U.S ambassador to the Holy See, Callista Gingrich, and her husband, former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
Pence later presented Newt Gingrich, who oversaw the impeachment proceedings against then-President Bill Clinton. to the pope, saying, “Speaker Gingrich, of course.”
Francis smiled warmly throughout the traditional exchange of gifts at the end of the audience. Pence presented the pope with a large, plain wooden cross made from a tree on the grounds of his official residence in Washington.
Francis gave Pence five bound books of his writings as pope. The pontiff then pointed to a large white envelope, explaining, “this is a message of peace.” Francis was referring to an annual message to promote peace issued by the Vatican.
After the audience with Francis, Pence headed to separate meetings with Italian President Sergio Mattarella and Premier Giuseppe Conte.
Pence told Mattarella that his father-in-law is an Italian-American, and noted that America in decades past “welcomed millions of Italians to our shores.”

AOC never mentions Bernie Sanders' name as she and Michael Moore pinch-hit for candidate at Iowa rally

With Bernie Sanders tied up in Washington at President Trump's Senate impeachment trial, a couple of his high-profie supporters filled in for him Friday at a campaign rally in Iowa.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and liberal filmmaker Michael Moore shared the duties for the 2020 presidential candidate in Iowa City. But in her speech closing out the event, Ocasio-Cortez -- who first endorsed Sanders back in October -- never once mentioned his name.
The Iowa rally -- in the home city of the University of Iowa -- was held one day after Sanders faced backlash from many Democrats after tweeting support for controversial podcast host Joe Rogan.
After several other guests spoke, Moore stepped up to the podium and began incessantly praising Sanders, an independent U.S. senator from Vermont. Moore claimed that watching Sanders on the campaign trail has made him cry.
“I’m so excited about our possibilities here. Right here in Iowa," Moore said. "Bernie was in Dubuque a couple of weeks ago and I scribbled this down here – I came to tears watching him say this.”
“It was a Q-and-A at a big town hall and someone asked him if he thought he was too old to be president of the United States [and Bernie said] 'I’ve been saying for months, I’ll tell you what’s too old -- 40 million people in this country not having health care. That’s too old.’”
Moore championed Sanders for his policies on climate change, the minimum wage and his record on civil rights, before claiming Sanders is the only candidate who can defeat President Trump in November.
“We have to crush Donald J. Trump with the truth and with a candidate who is the opposite of Donald J. Trump," he said.
At the end of his speech, Moore introduced Ocasio-Cortez and said she had "inspired" Sanders' second run for the White House.
When Ocasio-Cortez got to the stage, however, she alluded to Sanders but didn't mention his name once.
Instead, she echoed Moore's call to take a risk and said voters shouldn't settle for the status quo.
“It is bold and it is a risk,” she said. “We hedge our bets, we get more of the same. And the same has not been helping. So our job right now is to come together ...We’ve got ten days left, ten days (until the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 3)."
The New York Democrat also called for the abolition of two federal immigration agencies -- Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP). She also advocated for Medicare-for-all, and suggested that political leaders craft the nation's environmental policy around "indigenous wisdom."
“This is not just about how we win, it’s about how we heal," Ocasio-Cortez added. "From our bodies to this land, we are going to need entirely new paradigms of public policy in order to heal."
Earlier, Sanders had called in to the rally via phone and encouraged voters to support him in the upcoming caucuses.
The self-described democratic socialist then thanked Ocasio-Cortez and Moore before launching into a list of reasons why he believes he'll win the Democratic presidential nomination.
"We are going to win because we are developing an unprecedented multigenerational, multiracial, working-class movement which is prepared to take on the corporate elite and the entire One Percent and put together an administration that stands for justice," he said. "Economic justice, social justice, racial justice, and environmental justice."
Sanders, who referred to Trump as "the worst president in modern American history," promised to raise the minimum wage, ease restrictions on unions, pass a Medicare-for-all bill, institute Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal proposal, reform the criminal justice system, preserve Roe. V. Wade, legalize marijuana in all 50 states and end the "demonization" of illegal immigrants.
"The time is long overdue for us to have a government an economy that works for all of us," he added. "Not just the One Percent."

Schiff refers to CBS 'head on pike' story, infuriating GOP: 'Every one of us knows it is not true'

Senate Republicans -- including potential swing-voters -- expressed outrage Friday after lead House Impeachment Manager Adam Schiff, D-Calif., referred in his closing remarks at President Trump's Senate impeachment trial to a report that GOP members were told they'd face dire consequences if they voted to convict the president.
"CBS News reported last night that a Trump confidant said that key senators were warned, ‘Vote against the president and your head will be on a pike.’ I don’t know if that’s true," Schiff said, while trying to persuade his Senate colleagues to vote with "moral courage" rather than in their political self-interest.
Several senators went on record objecting to Schiff's comment.
"I thought he was doing fine with [talking about] moral courage until he got to the 'head on a pike.' That's where he lost me,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, who has said she might be open to calling witnesses in the trial, told reporters. “He's a good orator. ... It was just unnecessary.”

“He's a good orator. ... It was just unnecessary.”
— Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, center, and Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., react to the final statement of House Democratic impeachment manager Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., as they speak to the media at the end of a day of an impeachment trial of President Donald Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, Friday, Jan. 24, 2020, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (Associated Press)

After listening silently for most of the trial so far, several Republicans reportedly shook their heads and could be heard saying, “That's not true,” after Schiff made the remark.
“I hope it’s not true,” Schiff responded before continuing.
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, considered another key Republican vote, agreed with Murkowski.
“Not only have I never heard the ‘head on the pike’ line but also I know of no Republican senator who has been threatened in any way by anyone in the administration," she told reporters.

"I know of no Republican senator who has been threatened in any way by anyone in the administration."
— Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine

​​​​​​​Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, speaks to reporters Nov. 6, 2019, at the Capitol in Washington. (Associated Press)

Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., said, "No Republican senator has been told that. What he has proven to all of us is, he is capable of falsehoods and will tell it to the country. And would tell it to us when we are sitting in the Senate chamber. When every one of us knows it is not true."
Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., who has also said he would be open to witnesses, told reporters it’s “completely, totally false.”
“None of us have been told that,” he said. “That’s insulting and demeaning to everyone to say that we somehow live in fear and that the president has threatened all of us.″
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, called the story "baloney." She said she was listening to Schiff, "until he got to the part where he just completely made a bunch of bullcrap up."

"He just completely made a bunch of bullcrap up."
— Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa

Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, walks in the U.S. Capitol on the first full day of the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2020. (Associated Press)

Even some Democrats were miffed by the remark.
Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who hasn’t indicated how he plans to vote said, "That could have been left out, that's for sure."
Other Democrats scoffed, suggesting the outrage was a made-up excuse to oppose calling witnesses.
Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., told MSNBC, "The Republicans are so afraid to confront the actual facts here ... they're always looking for a diversion."
Sen. Chris Coons, D-De., agreed. "If that's your reason? That he mis-cited some press article? Come on," he said, according to Politico.
Trump’s defense team will begin their opening statements in the trial Saturday morning.
The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

George Soros Cartoons

 

 

Democrats' claim that the Trump administration broke America's promise to protect Ukraine from Russia by withholding military aid is just an example of the party's hypocrisy, Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, claimed Thursday.
"The Democratic House Managers’ hypocrisy is on full display," Ernst wrote on Twitter on Thursday evening, after Day 3 of Trump's Senate impeachment trial. "They’ve spent most of their time lecturing the Senate on aid to Ukraine, yet four of them voted AGAINST legislation that provided the very same aid they’re lecturing us on."
"What I find very interesting now is that the House Managers are very, very centered on the fact that Russia was invading Ukraine. And military funding to Ukraine," she said during a break from President Trump’s impeachment trial earlier Thursday, reminding reporters that Crimea was invaded in 2014 during the Obama administration.
Ernst told reporters the Obama administration reacted to the invasion by “sending blankets.”
Her remarks came after lead House Manager Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said the Trump administration had abused its power by withholding $400 million in military aid allegedly on the condition of investigating the Bidens.
Ernst said that, unlike former President Obama, Trump has sent “lethal aid” to Ukraine.
“These House managers did nothing of the sort to provide that assistance to Ukraine and yet now they are on their high horse … for President Trump not doing enough for Ukraine," she added.

"These House managers did nothing of the sort to provide that assistance to Ukraine and yet now they are on their high horse … for President Trump not doing enough for Ukraine." 
— U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa

Republicans criticized Obama for sanctioning Russia rather than sending arms to Ukraine after the 2014 invasion; the Obama administration said they were concerned that sending lethal aid could escalate the situation with Russia.
“The fact is that Ukraine, which is a non-NATO country, is going to be vulnerable to military domination by Russia no matter what we do,” Obama told The Atlantic at the time.
Between 2014 and 2016 the Obama administration also sent more than $600 million in assistance to Ukraine and started the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative that sends U.S. military equipment, Politifact reported.

 

Left-wing billionaire George Soros has accused Facebook of helping to re-elect Donald Trump leading up to the 2020 election.
Soros, 89, made the comments during a speech in Davos, Switzerland, Thursday. He accused the social media giant of working to re-elect Trump during this year's election campaign in exchange for protection.
“Facebook will work to re-elect Trump and Trump will protect Facebook,” the Hungarian-born U.S. investor said, according to Politico. “It makes me very concerned about the outcome of 2020.”

A Facebook company spokesman responded to Politico, saying "This is just plain wrong."
On Jan. 9, Facebook announced that it would continue to let politicians run advertisements and would not police the truthfulness of the messages posted.
"Ultimately, we don’t think decisions about political ads should be made by private companies," Rob Leathern, Facebook's director of product management, said at the time.
"In the absence of regulation, Facebook and other companies are left to design their own policies. We have based ours on the principle that people should be able to hear from those who wish to lead them, warts and all, and that what they say should be scrutinized and debated in public," Leathern added.
Soros' speech was made at a dinner hosted by the Open Society Foundations, an international grantmaking network founded by the billionaire. During the speech, he also criticized certain world leaders -- including Trump, China's Xi Jinping, India's Narendra Modi, Brazil's Jair Bolsonaro and Hungary's Viktor Orbán, according to Politico.
Soros said called Xi Jinping a "dictator" while exclaiming Trump was "a con man and a narcissist, who wants the world to revolve around him.”
He also praised Greta Thunberg and other teenage climate activists for their actions in addressing climate change, the outlet said.
In addition, Soros announced he was giving $1 billion into a new university network, which will be built around Bard College, north of New York City, and Soros’ Central European University.
Fox News' Frank Miles contributed to the report

Trump's Senate impeachment trial: GOP leadership tries to avoid defections on possible witness vote

 

Senate GOP leaders are trying to avoid defections in an anticipated vote next week on whether or not to allow for new witnesses in President Trump's impeachment trial and remain in close talks with those potential swing votes, according to Republican aides.
Allowing new witnesses would bring a wild-card factor to the trial, lengthen the process and potentially set up a protracted court fight over executive privilege.
GOP leaders are actively reaching out to Republican senators who could potentially defect -- Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Lamar Alexander of Tennesse and Mitt Romney of Utah -- and are trying to keep them in the fold, according to two GOP aides.
With all eyes on these potential swing votes, Collins was overhead Thursday evening raising concerns about the access of press.
After the trial recessed for the dinner break, Collins and Murkowski had an animated conversation on the Senate floor and Collins pointed up at the reporters above her in the balcony.
The Maine Republican was overheard saying she didn’t want the journalists overlooking from the front row and thought it should be emptied.
Collins continued to look up at reporters, and Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., and Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., joined the huddle. Reporters covering the historic trial are only allowed to bring pens and paper in the gallery, and typical tools of the trade -- phones, cameras, computers and even smartwatches -- are all banned.
As the trial continued into the night, Democrats re-upped their demands for new witnesses and documents to be entered into evidence, charging that the trial would be a "cover-up" without them. They need the help of four GOP senators to win the necessary majority vote.
But Republicans are actively trying to avoid any GOP defections. No new witnesses would mean a speedy trial and a quicker vote to acquit the president.
The swing GOP voters are under intense scrutiny in the Capitol as the 100 jurors weigh whether to remove Trump from office for obstruction of congress and abuse of power.
As Murkowski was darting to get to the impeachment trial on Thursday, she was asked if she was feeling any pressure. “Only to get upstairs,” she quipped before the elevator door closed.
Republicans argue that if the Democratic case for impeachment is so strong, they wouldn't need the Senate's help for extra witnesses to make their case.
"We are ready for the president's team to put their defense on," Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wy., said Thursday. "The president didn't have a chance to do that in the House. We have heard plenty from the House now. They say that they've had overwhelming evidence."
Trump's legal team says new witnesses aren't needed but would expect reciprocity if the Senate vote didn't go their way.
“If the other side were to get witnesses, we would have a series of witnesses, but we are nowhere near that process yet,” Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow said Thursday.
Trump himself raised the concern earlier this week about executive privilege and said there would be national security concerns if his former adviser John Bolton testified.
If the Senate votes in favor of getting witnesses and Trump administration communications related to withholding military aid to Ukraine, Trump's legal team could assert executive privilege -- setting off an unchartered court challenge.
Sekulow said that the administration was within its constitutional rights to withhold documents and blasted House Democrats for trying to shred the constitution.
Some GOP senators have promoted witness reciprocity and called for Hunter Biden to testify about what he was doing on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma, in exchange for Bolton testifying.
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., wouldn’t predict whether there would be GOP defections but said the caucus is in regular talks to keep tabs on where senators stand.
“There’s an ongoing conversation, informal, on what people are thinking. We are spending a lot of time together,” Hawley said.
With the Senate GOP leadership trying to avoid going down the witness path with Democrats, they are actively reaching out to potential defectors -- Murkowski, Collins, Alexander and Romney.
The four were "instrumental" in changing Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s organizing resolution on the fly to allow more days for opening statements and avoiding middle-of-the-night arguments. There is a strategic effort to keep these four involved in the process, an aide told Fox News.
A speedy trial and acquittal without witnesses and documents would benefit the White House, and GOP leaders are trying to avoid a spectacle.
“There’s a bunch of people on my side that want to call Joe Biden and Hunter Biden,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. “I want to end this thing sooner rather than later. I don’t want to turn it into a circus."
Fox News' Jason Donner contributed to this report.