New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman Cartoons & one for Ford

Judge Nap Looks At New York State's Planned Trump Fdn Criminal Probe

New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is opening an investigation into the Donald J. Trump Foundation, Shepard Smith reported Wednesday.
In response, Trump’s campaign called Schneiderman, a vocal Hillary Clinton supporter, a “partisan hack”
“This is nothing more than a left-wing hit job designed to distract from Crooked Hillary Clinton’s disastrous week,” Trump spokesman Jason Miller said.
Fox News senior judicial analyst Judge Andrew P. Napolitano said Schneiderman is investigating an allegation of bribery by the foundation that occurred in Florida, where the group gave $25,000 to a SuperPAC supporting Sunshine State attorney general Pamela Bondi.
Bondi is a Republican and Trump supporter.
Bondi’s office was apparently investigating Trump at the time, but the investigation was curtailed around the time of the donation.
The IRS fined the DJT foundation $2,500 for the illegal gift, which the foundation said was made as a clerical error—it should have come from Trump personally rather than through his foundation.
Trump “has a long and unhappy history here in New York with Schneiderman,” Napolitano said on Shepard Smith Reporting, noting that Schniederman’s Albany office is also probing Trump University.
“I doubt that anything will come of this before Election Day,” Napolitano said.
“Don’t know where this is going to go.”

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman,Schneiderman, a supporter of Trump's Democratic rival in the presidential race, Hillary Clinton

CNN's Amanpour suggests Clinton health coverage sexist

Guy Benson: Amanpour attempted a spin on Hillary's behalf

After learning from the mainstream media during the last eight years of the Obama presidency that seemingly benign phrases and words like “Chicago,” “that one” and “golf” are now deemed racist, viewers are getting a similar lesson when it comes to Clinton coverage.
CNN host Christiane Amanpour suggested on air Monday that the heavy coverage of the Democratic nominee's health is simply sexist.
“Can’t a girl have a sick day or two?” Amanpour said, before asking: “What about Donald Trump’s tax returns, where are they?”
This was after Hillary Clinton for days experienced coughing fits on the trail and then came close to collapsing on the sidelines of a 9/11 event Sunday, before being whisked away in an SUV. Her campaign then revealed she had pneumonia, while saying she had become dehydrated and overheated.
Amanpour appealed to her colleagues to lay off.
“When it comes to overqualified women having to try a hundred times harder than underqualified men to get a break or even a level playing field, well, we know that story,” she said.
As proof that sick men can do the job of the presidency just fine, she first cited the example of President Franklin Pierce -- a mid-19^th century president who passed out in the battlefield.
As first noted by Mediaite, Amanpour cited the examples of the media covering up President Franklin Roosevelt’s debilitating polio and John F. Kennedy’s many health issues – lapses in journalism that journalists generally accept as ethically problematic today. Amanpour said these health crises did not stop them from being good presidents.
“Leading the world in sickness and in health—if the boys can do it, why not the women?” she asked.
Amanpour seemed to approve of the bygone media attitude that the public didn’t need to know their commander-in-chief was wheelchair bound (FDR) or was given an anti-psychoticfor fluctuating moods (JFK).
Years ago, Amanpour’s husband, James Rubin, was a member of Clinton’s 2008 campaign.
Amanpour did not mention how male candidates' health has been scrutinized before. 2008 Republican nominee John McCain and 1996 nominee Bob Dole were both scuritinized for their health and their age – as was President Ronald Reagan when he stood for re-election.

U.S. to Cede Control of Internet Domain Names to Global Agency

Are we facing the beginning of the end of a free and open Internet?
Chief White House Correspondent James Rosen reported on what some Republicans are describing as relinquishing control of the Internet to authoritarian regimes.
On Oct. 1, under a plan in place for two decades, the Commerce Department will cease to exercise contractual control over a Los Angeles-based non-profit called the International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the entity that approves the .com's, .gov's and other Internet domain names.
Republicans in the Senate Judiciary Committee, including Ted Cruz, today grilled Commerce Department and ICANN officials about the planned transition.

House Republicans reach deal to avoid vote on impeaching IRS commissioner

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen

House Republicans reached an agreement late Wednesday to avoid a potentially divisive floor vote on impeaching IRS Commissioner John Koskinen.
The deal scraps the vote on the so-called "privileged" impeachment resolution that had been expected to take place Thursday. Instead, the House Judiciary Committee will consider Koskinen's impeachment, with the IRS boss expected to testify sometime next week.
The agreement makes it unlikely that any vote by the full House to impeach Koskinen will happen until after the November election, if at all. House Republican leadership had balked on moving forward on impeachment proceedings during an election season, arguing that an impeachment vote risked irritating voters. Others said Koskinen deserved a full House Judiciary Committee probe before embarking on the seldom-used impeachment process.
The effort by conservative Republicans flows from the IRS' 2013 admission that for several years, it had targeted Tea Party groups seeking tax exemptions for rigorous examinations.
Conservatives say Koskinen obstructed the House GOP's investigation of the treatment of tea party groups seeking tax exemptions. Koskinen and his Democratic allies say he did nothing wrong and provided Congress with all the information he had and knew about.
The conservative House Freedom Caucus, which used a procedural maneuver to force a floor vote earlier this week, celebrated the development as a victory.
"This hearing will give every American the opportunity to hear John Koskinen answer under oath why he misled Congress, allowed evidence pertinent to an investigation to be destroyed, and defied Congressional subpoenas and preservation orders," the caucus said in a statement. "It will also remove any lingering excuses for those who have been hesitant to proceed with this course of action."
But the deal came only after conservatives predicted that their impeachment resolution was going to get sidelined by Democratic and Republican opposition Thursday. Even if the House was able to send the resolution to the Senate, Democrats there have enough votes to prevent Republicans from removing Koskinen from office.
The House needs only a simple majority vote to impeach a federal official, the equivalent of an indictment. The Senate then holds a trial and needs a two-thirds majority to find the official guilty and remove him or her from office.

Pleading the 5th Cartoons

Ivanka Trump: US must 'catch up with the times' on guaranteed maternity leave

Ivanka Trump on the importance of child-care reforms

Ivanka Trump told Fox News' Megyn Kelly Tuesday night that the U.S. must "catch up with the times" and offer guaranteed paid maternity leave.
"Cost of childcare is the single largest expense affecting American families ... even exceeding housing," Trump said on "The Kelly File." "The United States is the only country in the world that does not offer guaranteed maternity care."
Ivanka Trump spoke shortly after her father, Republican nominee Donald Trump, called for guaranteeing new mothers six weeks of paid maternity leave and suggested new incentives for employers to provide their workers with childcare.
Building on earlier proposals, Trump proposed allowing families with a stay-at-home parent to deduct the average cost of child care from their taxes, as well as costs associated with caring for elderly dependent relatives. The deduction would apply only to individuals earning $250,000 or less, or $500,000 or less if filing jointly.
"The tax codes were written at a time when American women weren’t part of the work force, so there have to be reforms," Ivanka Trump said Tuesday evening. "This is what the Trump presidency promises, new solutions, fresh solutions to existing problems."

The real estate mogul also called for the creation of "Dependent Care Savings Accounts" that would allow families to set aside money to look after children or elderly parents.

The latest headlines on the 2016 elections from the biggest name in politics.

Trump's Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, has called for 12 weeks parental leave for both mothers and fathers paid for by taxes on the wealthy. In response, Ivanka Trump said that childcare was an issue "the Democrats talk about, but they don't own."

Donald Trump has credited Ivanka, the second of his three children with ex-wife Ivana, with pushing him to formulate a policy on the issue.
"She is the one who has been pushing for it so hard: 'Daddy, Daddy we have to do this,'" Trump said in Iowa earlier Tuesday. "She's very smart, and she's right."

Clinton IT specialist ignores subpoena for House hearing; other witnesses plead 5th

Former Clinton aide Pagliano a no-show at email hearing

The former State Department IT specialist who set up Hillary Clinton’s private server ignored a subpoena to appear Tuesday before a House committee hearing, while other tech experts who helped maintain the system asserted their Fifth Amendment right not to testify – frustrating Republican lawmakers trying to dig deeper into the former secretary of state’s email setup.
House oversight committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said he’ll now consider a “full range of options” to address IT aide Bryan Pagliano’s “failure” to attend.
“He should be here. … It is not optional,” Chaffetz said. “His attendance is required here.”
Pagliano is considered a vital witness in the Clinton email case. He spoke previously to the FBI under immunity, telling the bureau there were no successful security breaches of the server. Pagliano also refused to answer questions last year before a House panel investigating the deadly 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya. His lawyers said at the time that Pagliano did not want to relinquish his rights under the U.S. Constitution's Fifth Amendment against self-incrimination.
Republicans on Tuesday questioned why Pagliano would avoid the latest hearing if he had immunity, though Democrats pushed back. According to Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., Pagliano’s lawyer said the request was an “abuse of process.”
Two other officials from Platte River Networks, Bill Thornton and Paul Combetta, did comply with subpoenas to appear. However, when it came time to answer questions, they pleaded the Fifth. The Denver-based technology company maintained Clinton’s server when it was moved from her Chappaqua, New York, home to a data center in northern New Jersey.
Combetta took the Fifth six times and Thornton took the Fifth four times, before both witnesses were excused.
After each question, they recited a variation of the line: “On the advice of counsel, I respectfully decline to answer and assert my Fifth Amendment constitutional privilege.”
Cummings said he could “understand” why they were not addressing questions.
But Chaffetz voiced frustration when Thornton declined to even answer whether he’d been questioned by the FBI. GOP lawmakers have wanted to question tech officials on the deletion of email records and other alleged attempts to destroy devices.
Chaffetz also said there will be consequences for Pagliano's refusal to appear and for "thumbing his nose at Congress." He didn't specify what the penalties would be but said, "We're not letting go of this."
A letter from Pagliano's attorney released by the committee says Pagliano will continue to assert his constitutional right not to testify.
The only witness remaining after the unfruitful initial questioning was Bill Clinton aide Justin Cooper, who answered lawmakers’ questions.
During that process, he confirmed that he had access to the Clinton server but did not hold a security clearance.
The email issue has shadowed Clinton's candidacy, and Republicans have been steadfast in focusing on her use of a private server for government business, with several high-profile hearings leading up to the election. Democrats insist the sole purpose of the hearings is to undermine Clinton's bid for the presidency.
Chaffetz on Monday escalated the GOP's battle with the FBI after its decision in July not to recommend criminal charges against Clinton for her use of the private email system by serving a top FBI official with a subpoena for the full case file. Chaffetz and other Republicans on the panel said the bureau has withheld summaries of interviews with witnesses and unnecessarily blacked out material from documents sent last month.
“We are entitled to the full file," he said.
Dismissing the "emergency" hearing held late on a Monday, Cummings said: "As far as I can tell, the only `emergency' is that the election is less than two months away."
Chaffetz issued the subpoena to Jason Herring, the acting assistant FBI director for congressional affairs. Herring and six other Obama administration officials appeared before the committee to discuss the investigative files. The witnesses on several occasions said they could not answer the questions from lawmakers in an open forum.