Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canada welcomes refugees

Go for it Idiot :-)

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Saturday that Canada will welcome refugees rejected by President Donald Trump.
Trudeau also plans to discuss the success of Canada's refugee policy with Trump.
Trudeau reacted to Trump's visa ban for people from certain Muslim-majority countries by tweeting, "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength. #WelcomeToCanada."
Trump signed an executive order on Friday that he billed as a necessary step to stop "radical Islamic terrorists" from coming to the U.S. A 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program was also issued.
Trudeau posted a picture on Twitter where he is greeting a Syrian child back in 2015 at the Toronto airport.
Trudeau oversaw the arrival of over 39,000 Syrian refugees soon after he was elected.
"The Prime Minister is looking forward to discussing the successes of Canada's immigration and refugee policy with the President when they next speak," spokeswoman for Trudeau, Kate Purchase said.
Toronto Mayor John Tory weighed in, calling the city the most diverse in the world. "We understand that as Canadians we are almost all immigrants, and that no one should be excluded on the basis of their ethnicity or nationality," Tory said in a statement.
Trump's order singled out Syrians for the most aggressive ban, ordering that anyone from that country, including those fleeing civil war, are indefinitely blocked from coming to the United States.
"We have been assured that Canadian citizens traveling on Canadian passports will be dealt with in the usual process," Purchase said.
Earlier the U.S. State Department said that Canadians with dual citizenship from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Somalia, Syria, Yemen and Libya would be denied entry for the next three months.
Trudeau also posted a statement on Twitter with the hashtag, "ACanadianIsACanadian."

Federal judge grants stay to allow those with visas to remain, 10 still detained at JFK

Judge Ann M. Donnelly

United States District Court Judge for the Eastern District of New York
Born 1959 in Royal Oak, MI

 

Federal Judicial Service:

Judge, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of New York

Nominated by Barack Obama on January 7, 2015, to a seat vacated by Sandra L. Townes. Confirmed by the Senate on October 20, 2015, and received commission on October 21, 2015.

A federal judge in Brooklyn, New York issued an emergency stay Saturday night that temporarily blocks the U.S. government from sending people out of the country after they have landed at a U.S. airport with valid visas.
The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application. The Department of Homeland Security said that more than 170 people were denied entry to the U.S. as of Saturday night, according to Reuters.
The ruling by Judge Ann Donnelly of the U.S. District Courtfor the Eastern District of New York came during a hearing called after President Donald Trump issued an executive order blocking people from seven Muslim-majority from entering the United States and putting a temporary halt to refugee admissions
Twelve refugees were detained at JFK Airport within hours of Trump's order restricting immigration from seven majority-Muslim nations -- but two were released later in the day -- as hundreds of protesters continued to amass at the busy airport throughout the day and into the evening.
One of the Iraqis, Hameed Jhalid Darweesh, 53, was released by midday Saturday. “I suffered to move here, to get my family here …. I can’t go back,” Darweesh said shortly after his release, according to the New York Post. Asked if he’d be killed in Iraq, he answered: “Yes, yes.”
Hameed Khalid Darweesh, an Army interpreter in Iraq, had been stopped as he traveled with his wife and three kids when agents pulled him aside, according to the New York Times.
The other Iraqi detainee, Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi, 33, was released at about 6:30 p.m. The fate of 10 other refugees, whose nationalities were not immediately known, is unclear.
Reps. Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan) and Nydia Velazquez (D-Brooklyn) announced the number of refugees held at the airport. “This should not happen in America. We shouldn’t have to demand the release of refugees one by one,” the two members of Congress said in a statement.
"They have been detained illegally. I am begging you to go and revisit this. It's ill-advised, it's mean spirited," said Velazquez, during a press conference.
Meanwhile, the National Immigration Law Center and other civil liberties organizations have filed a suit in federal court in New York on behalf of the two Iraqi men that seeks to certify the case as a class-action on behalf of other who organizers claim have been detained illegally. Karen Tumlin, legal director at the NILC, issued the following statement:
“Trump’s order keeps some of the world’s most vulnerable people in life threatening danger. ... Many refugees like our client risked their lives to help the United States government. The fact that the government has now decided to turn its back on those who served and protected us isn’t just unconscionable. It’s unconstitutional.”
Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe (D) held an afternoon press conference in response to Trump's actions to say that we "cannot tolerate this type of activity."
The White House moved Saturday to defend the president’s refugee order, saying Muslims are not being targeted.
“The notion that this is a ‘Muslim ban’ is ludicrous,” a senior administration official confirmed to Fox News.
Other travelers were being stopped from boarding U.S.-bound flights at overseas airports as the Trump refugee ban went into effect Friday night.
Trump on Friday suspended refugee admissions for four months and indefinitely banned those from war-torn Syria, pending program changes that are to ensure refugees won't harm national security.
A U.S. federal law enforcement official says any non-U.S. citizen from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen is now barred from entering the United States.
That covers legal permanent residents -- green card holders -- and visa-holders from those seven countries who are out of the United States after Friday, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order with the temporary ban. They cannot return to the U.S. for 90 days.
The official says there's an exemption for immigrants and legal permanent residents whose entry is in the U.S. national interest, but it's unclear how that exemption will be applied.
The official says visa and green card holders already in the U.S. will be allowed to stay. The official wasn't authorized to publicly discuss the details of how Trump's order is being put in place and spoke only on condition of anonymity.
Customs and Border Protection is notifying airlines about passengers whose visas had been canceled or legal residents scheduled to fly back to the U.S., and the airlines are being told to keep them off those flights.
The order also imposes a temporary ban on travelers from Iran, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Sudan and Yemen.
The lawyers said custom agents wouldn’t let them meet with their clients who they said had valid visas to enter the U.S.
“Who is the person we need to talk to?” asked Mark Doss, a lawyer with the International Refugee Assistance Project.
“Mr. President,” the paper quoted a customs agent as responding. “Call Mr. Trump.”
“President Trump's war on equality is already taking a terrible human toll. This ban cannot be allowed to continue,” the group's Omar Jadwat said.
In Cairo, airport officials prevented seven U.S.-bound migrants -- six from Iraq and one from Yemen -- from boarding an EgyptAir flight to New York.
The officials said the seven migrants, escorted by officials from the U.N. refugee agency, were stopped from boarding the plane after authorities at Cairo airport contacted their counterparts at JFK.
Qatar Airways told passengers bound for the U.S. from the seven newly banned majority Muslim countries that they need to have either a U.S. green card or diplomatic visa to travel.
A statement on the company's website says: "Nationals of the following countries: Sudan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Yemen ... may travel to the U.S. only if they are in possession of a permanent resident card (Green card) or any of the below visas."
It listed foreign government, United Nations, international organization and NATO visas.
Late Friday, the International Rescue Committee called Trump's suspension of the U.S. refugee resettlement program a "harmful and hasty" decision.
The group’s president David Miliband said, "America must remain true to its core values. America must remain a beacon of hope."
He said the U.S. vetting process for prospective refugees is already robust -- involving biometric screening and up to 36 months of vetting by "12 to 15 government agencies."
“This is no time for America to turn its back on people ready to become patriotic Americans,” he said.

DHS will continue to enforce Trump's travel ban

The Department of Homeland Security issued a statement early Sunday saying that they plan on continuing to “enforce all of the president’s executive orders in a manner that ensures the safety and security of the American people.”
The DHS said the court order would not affect the overall implementation of the White House order and the court order affected a small number of travelers who were inconvenienced by security procedures upon their return.
“The president’s executive orders remain in place—prohibited travel will remain prohibited, and the U.S. government retains its right to revoke visas at any time if required for national security or public safety,” the statement said.
A federal judge issued an emergency order Saturday night temporarily barring the U.S. from deporting people from nations subject to President Donald Trump's travel ban, saying travelers who had been detained had a strong argument that their legal rights had been violated.
Stephen Miller, a senior adviser to the White House, said, "Nothing in the Brooklyn judge's order in anyway impedes or prevents the implementation of the president's executive order which remains in full, complete and total effect."
U.S. District Judge Ann Donnelly in New York issued the emergency order after lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union filed a court petition on behalf of people from seven predominantly Muslim nations who were detained at airports across the country as the ban took effect.
The order barred U.S. border agents from removing anyone who arrived in the U.S. with a valid visa from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. It also covered anyone with an approved refugee application.
Homeland Security said the order affects a small amount of people traveling internationally.
The DHS said the order was the “first step towards reestablishing control over America's borders and national security.”
Trump’s travel ban sparked protests around the country at several international airports. Demonstrators ranged from a few dozen people to thousands.
Under Trump's order, it had appeared that an untold number of foreign-born U.S. residents now traveling outside the U.S. could be stuck overseas for at least 90 days even though they held permanent residency "green cards" or other visas. However, an official with the DHS said Saturday night that no green-card holders from the seven countries cited in Trump's order had been prevented from entering the U.S.
Trump billed his sweeping executive order as a necessary step to stop "radical Islamic terrorists" from coming to the U.S. It included a 90-day ban on travel to the U.S. by citizens of Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia or Yemen and a 120-day suspension of the U.S. refugee program.
Trump's order also drew support from some Republican lawmakers who have urged more security measures for the refugee vetting program.
The DHS said in the statement that they “will faithfully execute the immigration laws, and we will treat all of those we encounter humanely and with professionalism.” They also added that they plan to ensure the safety of the American people by making sure those entering the U.S. pose no threat.

hamilton musical cartoons

'Hamilton' cast to sing at Superbowl 51?

 What a Joke.

Dumb Ass.

Trump's hard-nosed executive order asks what U.N. money is going for-and is it worth it?

Trump set to decrease US funding of United Nations

The Trump Administration intends to take a hard-nosed approach to one of the frustrating mysteries left behind by the Obama Administration: Just exactly how much money does the U.S. give to the United Nations, what is the money going for—and is it worth it?
The Administration’s tough strategy is specifically aimed at reducing, rather than eliminating, U.S. support  for the world organization and will not affect, at least in the short term, Washington’s current dues-paying  commitment to pay 22 per cent of the U.N.’s so-called “regular” budget ($5.6 billion for 2016-2017) and 28.5 percent  of its peacekeeping obligations ($7.9 billion) this year.
But at the same time, the intent is clearly to hold the U.N.’s feet close to the fire on its value to U.S. goals and interests, as well as take special aim at organizations that offer full membership to the Palestinian Authority or the Palestinian Liberation Organization, or are heavily influenced by states that sponsor or support terrorism and/or systematically violate human rights.
The methods for doing that include seeing what the organization has done with the money it has already received, finding ways to turn  as much spending as feasible into voluntary rather than mandatory contributions—which the Administration would like  to cut by 40 per cent—better sharing the international cost burden in the future, and making sure that U.S. contributions are  “used in a manner consistent with their designated purpose.”
Greater voluntary funding rather than automatic dues-paying has long been advocated by conservative reformers such as former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. John Bolton (who is also a Fox News Contributor) as helping to bring the world organization into greater conformity with U.S. values and objectives.
The new approach is laid out in a draft presidential executive order obtained by Fox News that aims straightforwardly to “ensure better alignment between United States national interests and U.S. monetary support to the United Nations and other international organizations.”
Parts of the draft order are evidently still in flux, but that topic has long been a focus of concern among conservatives and U.S. activists suspicious of the runaway implications of the U.N.’s expanding global bureaucracy, but also among reformers frustrated at unsuccessful U.S. and Western efforts to rein in U.N. spending and make it more transparent and accountable, even while the U.S. remains far and away the world body’s biggest single financial supporter.
Those frustrations were especially aggravated by the Obama Administration’s stealth approach to U.S. funding: no aggregated figures on U.S. support for the U.N. and its sprawling array of funds, programs and agencies since 2010, when the overall tally, which could well have been low-balled, was about $7.7 billion.
The Administration has not yet given an indication of when the executive order will be published, but the intention in the draft version is to have the process in gear to  start taking effect by Jan. 1, 2018.
Indeed, notes Brett Schaefer, an expert on U.N. financing at the conservative Heritage Foundation, any changes as a result of the process are unlikely to be made until President Trump presents his budget for fiscal 2019. “It’s going to be a very deliberate process,” notes Schaefer. “Moreover, it’s incredibly overdue. The U.S. should be doing this as a matter of course.”
The title of the draft executive order—“Auditing and Reducing U.S. Funding of International Organizations”—makes clear that the Administration sees the challenge of transparency in the U.S. government itself as a necessary first step in dealing with semi-eternal complaints that the U.S. spends too much and gets too little for its U.N. financial support .
To deal with that, the draft order calls for:

• Creation of an “International Funding Accountability Committee” in the executive branch, including the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, the Director of National Intelligence and the Counsel to the President, or their delegates, to take stock of spending on the U.N. and other international organizations (the U.N. got  about 90 per cent of that total, according to the Obama Administration’s 2010 tally)
• Preparation of  a committee report by Jan. 1 of next year on the full tally of “current and expected” U.S. funding over the past eight years for any international organization, how much of that was voluntary or mandated, “how the organization expects to use [the funds] going forward”—and whether the organization provides enough information to make that possible;
• The committee to ”identify a compelling national interest…directly advanced by continued funding,” as well as any organization where that condition wouldn’t be met;
• Recommendations on “appropriate strategies”  for reform that would emphasize “transition” from dues paying to voluntary contributions, as well as “legislative, regulatory and administrative mechanisms” to “selectively fund the specific parts of an international organization that align with U.S. interests.”
• Recommendations on  “appropriate strategies”  to reduce any “disproportionate”  U.S. share of support for specific U.N. and other budgets.

The order also calls for a special focus on a grab-bag of controversial international spending that includes:

• Iinternational peacekeeping operations,  where U.N. spending has steeply  spiraled over a decade, though it is now slowly declining, and where sexual abuse and other scandals have proliferated;
• Pay scales  for U.N. and other international staffers, which have eluded serious U.S. attempts at analysis
• “Resolutions or sanctions that single out the State of Israel.”

The draft executive order takes specific aim at the United Nations Population Fund (already affected by a prior Trump Administration decision to withdraw funding from international organizations that support abortion) and the International Criminal Court, as well as “any United Nations affiliate or other international organization that circumvents sanctions against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea or the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Moreover, the process is clearly seen as ongoing—the draft order calls for the Accountability Committee to “perform future reviews as directed by the President”—and, to prevent another black hole from developing over U.N. funding, to  keep its accounting results on a public website.

Google calls staffers back to US after Trump order on immigration, report says

Google called on its employees who may be affected by President Trump’s immigration order to get back to the U.S. as soon as possible, according to a report published Saturday.
Bloomberg obtained a copy of a memo from the company’s CEO, Sundar Pichai.
"It’s painful to see the personal cost of this executive order on our colleagues," Pichai wrote. "We’ve always made our view on immigration issues known publicly and will continue to do so."
An unidentified source told Bloomberg that the concern is that employees from one of the seven countries that Trump identified may not be allowed back in to the U.S., even if that person has  a valid visa.
"We are advising our clients from those seven countries who have green cards or any type of H-1B visa not to travel outside the U.S." Ava Benach, a partner at immigration law firm Benach Collopy LLP, said in the report. “No one is really sure whether a green card holder from these seven countries can return to the U.S. now. It’s fairly clear that an H-1B visa holder can’t," Benach said.
Trump's executive order suspends all immigration from countries with terrorism concerns for 90 days.
The State Department said the three-month ban in the directive applied to Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen - all Muslim-majority nations.
The order also calls for Homeland Security and State Department officials, along with the director of national intelligence, to review what information the government needs to fully vet would-be visitors and come up with a list of countries that don't provide it.
The order says the government will give countries 60 days to start providing the information or citizens from those countries will be barred from traveling to the United States.
The temporary halt to refugee processing does include exceptions for people claiming religious persecution, so long as their religion is a minority faith in their country. That could apply to Christians from Muslim-majority countries.

Trump-Putin call will be positive says top Russian official

The first official contact between President Donald Trump and his Russia counterpart Vladimir Putin is expected to be “positive”, Russian officials say.
Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted influential security chief Nikolai Patrushey on Saturday. He is the secretary of Russia’s Security Council.
The telephone call between expected to take place later Saturday will be the first official contact between the two leaders since Trump was sworn in as president last week.
TRUMP, MEXICAN LEADER TALK -- BY PHONE -- AS TENSIONS RISE
Trump senior advisor Kellyanne Conway told “Fox & Friends” on Friday that the two leaders may speak about U.S. sanctions against Russia and how to improve relations between the two nations.
Recent polls show that anti-American sentiment in Russia has dropped to 56 percent. Pollsters say it’s due to Trump’s indication he wants to improve relations.
The Kremlin has welcomed Trump's promises to mend ties with Moscow, which have been badly strained by the Ukrainian crisis, the war in Syria and allegations of Russian meddling in the U.S. elections.
According to Denis Volkav of the Levada Center, Russia’s independent pollster, the Russian government has been gradually ending state television propaganda to get the public ready for possible reconciliation.
Ahead of the call planned for Saturday, Trump was noncommittal about whether he was considering lifting the economic penalties. He told reporters: "We'll see what happens. As far as the sanctions, very early to be talking about that."
Trump made those remarks Friday alongside British Prime Minister Theresa May, whose country — as part of the European Union — also levied sanctions on Russia following its provocations in Ukraine. Voicing the view of many in Europe, May said, "We believe the sanctions should continue."
On Saturday, Trump is also set to speak with the prime minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe, German Chancellor Angela Merkel. In the afternoon the president is scheduled to speak with the president of France, François Hollande, and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
Vice President Mike Pence was expected to be on the Putin call with Trump. He wasn't expected to join other diplomatic calls the president planned for Saturday.

McConnell refuses to say whether 'nuclear option' in Supreme Court nomination is on table

The top Republican Senator Friday refused to say whether or not his colleagues would take the so-called “nuclear option” during the confirmation process for President Trump’s Supreme Court pick, but promised that the nominee will be “confirmed.”
“My answer’s going to be ... [Democrats] have set the standard,” Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., told Politico.
If Republicans are unable to secure enough Democratic votes for Trump’s pick, they can change the rules and curb the filibuster. Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., did that for lower court nominees and other nominations in 2013.
Trump has called on McConnell to kill the filibuster if Democrats resist his pick, but McConnell said the decision is not up to Trump.
"That’s not a presidential decision. That’s a Senate decision," McConnell told Politico.
Senate Republicans prevented former President Obama from filling Justice Antonin Scalia's seat, a political gamble that paid off when Trump was elected.
Trump has promised to seek someone in the mold of the conservative icon, who died nearly a year ago after serving on the Supreme Court for more than 29 years.
Trump said that his nominee is someone who will get approved, but Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Democrats will vigorously fight any nominee not “mainstream.”
As minority leader, Schumer won't have the same power as McConnell to block a nominee. But his words signal that Democrats could filibuster and force Republicans to round up 60 votes to move ahead.
That will be a challenge for the GOP since they only hold 52 seats. McConnell suggested to the magazine that Senate democrats should not even require 60 votes.
GREGG JARRETT: THE FIRST (AND FRIVOLOUS) LAWSUIT AGAINST PRESIDENT TRUMP 
“The view was that you don’t filibuster judges ,” McConnell told the magazine. “It’s ironic that Professor Schumer was actually the one that said let’s open up the toolbox and use all of the tools. And so he’s the guy you ought to be talking to on  that issue: He  invited, in effect, where we are today.”
A spokesman from Schumer’s office, in response to McConnell, said, “People in glass  houses shouldn’t throw stones.”